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COMMEMORATIVE DISCOURSE^, 



PRONODNCED AT 



QUINCY, MASS., 25 MAY, 1840, 



SECOND CENTENNIAL ANNIVERSARY 



ANCIENT INCORPORATION OF THE TOWN. 



AN APPENDIX. 



By GEORGE WHITNEY 



BOSTON: 
JAMES MUNROE AND COMPANY. 

MDCCCXL. 



COMMEMORATIVE DISCOURSE. 



COMMEMORATIVE DISCOURSE 



PRONOUNCED AT 



QUINCY, MASS., 25 MAY, 1840, 



^ SECOND CENTENNIAL ANNIVERSARY 



ANCIENT INCORPORATION OF THE TOWN. 



AN APPENDIX. 



-/- 



By GEORGE WHITNEY 



BOSTON: 
JAMES MUNROE AND COMPANY. 

M DCCC XL. 



(AMBKllXiK. I'KKSS : 
MKT(;AliI', TOllliV, ANII UALl.Ol). 



i 



THE YOUNG MEN OP QUINCY, 



AT WHOSE REQUEST 



THIS DISCOURSE WAS DELIVEKED, 



AND TO ALL WHO CONTRIBUTED TO OUR INTERESTING CELEURATION, 



THESE r A G E s 



^re 2XespectCulln 33el>(catet) 



DISCOURSE. 



FRIENDS, FELLOW-NATIVES, AXD DESCENDANTS 

OF THIS ANCIENT INCORPORATION. 

We meet this day, in obedience to the dictates of the 
highest sentiments in man. We have gathered togeth- 
er, scattered as we are in our various pursuits, in the 
spirit of a fihal and dutiful reverence, to commemorate 
the times that have passed, and our Fathers, who made 
them what they were. We come to testify our admiration 
of all that was elevating and ennobling in those who 
first stepped upon these shores, and who in later peri- 
ods contributed their part towards the good institutions 
and manifold privileges with which we are surrounded. 
We come, amidst comforts and ever newly opening 
blessings, — such as tlieir fondest hopes never dared to 
dream of, — to be grateful for their patience and sacri- 
fices, and trust in God in times of peril and darkness 
and deprivations, such as we may try to describe, but 
can never adequately conceive. We come, after two 
centuries and six generations of men have passed 
away, to stand around their graves, yet among the 
works, where they most emphatically live, that we may 
attempt to do some feeble justice to their principles 
and example, and to our own feelings also, in the trib- 
ute we thus pay to their memories. 

With this day, two hundred years have elapsed, and 
1 



a new century commences, since an act was passed by 
the General Court incorporating a town in this place. 
Previously to this period, as is almost too well known 
to be repeated, a settlement here of civihzed men had 
already been begun, following rapidly in the w ake of the 
Pilgrims at Plymouth. In 1625, fifteen years before 
the time alluded to, Captain Wollaston, with about 
thirty in his company, as is supposed, — the number 
being nowhere, so far as I am acquainted, definitely 
designated, — landed somewhere on the shore near the 
mount, which afterwards received his name, and in the 
language of the old historians " sat down," either upon 
the mount, or in the region round about. In other 
words, they came and fixed their abode and planted a 
colony here. From subsequent events we are left to 
infer that there were no very exalted aims, hke those 
which actuated many of the early pilgrims, either in 
the heart of Wollaston or his comrades. And yet with 
regard both to himself and some who accompanied him, 
it may possibly have been otherwise. We are sure, 
there was little to commend in Thomas Morton, or in 
those who were ready to sympathize with him. At 
any rate, we learn that after " spending much labor, 
cost, and time in planting the place," * things did not 
answer Wollaston's expectation, and he departed to 
Virginia. This can be considered, to be sure, no posi- 
tive proof that Wollaston's aims were not so elevated 
as the noblest of that long line of self-exiled men, who 
came out to these distant shores, but the great mass 
of them Avere not in the habit of calculating 
profit and loss in any such way, nor did they think 

* Hubbard's History of New England, p. 103. 



their hardships and disappointments, where once they 
had planted themselves, of sufficient moment to urge 
them to try new locations. Wollaston's enterprise 
bore strong marks, to say the least, of being merely a 
pecuniary speculation. 

The fifteen years, which elapsed from the landing of 
Wollaston to the incorporation of the town, were 
somewhat eventful ones, and appear to have been of 
considerable moment in the annals of those times. 
Thomas Morton, already alluded to, and one who 
accompanied Wollaston, proved a disorganizer, and 
a ringleader of such as were disposed to sympathize 
with him. It would be difficult, with an eye the most 
indulgent, and making liberal allowances, in the ex- 
treme, for the sanctimonious views and rigid discipline 
of the Puritans, to apologize for his own private irreg- 
ularities, his conduct to the Indians, whether friendly or 
inimical, and specially for the contempt with which he 
treated all order and authority. He became indeed the 
source of great trouble to the early settlers here and 
elsewhere, a constant annoyance to those in authority, 
and withal, in his disposition and conduct, about as 
incorrigible a subject as they could well desire for their 
management. Among his notorious acts of dissipation 
and riot, he set up a May Pole to be danced and sung 
round, than which, it would not have been easy to 
have devised anything more odious to the scrupulous 
Puritans, short of the actual introduction among them 
of the Evil One himself. Subsequently, also, in various 
ways, his conduct was exceedingly reprehensible. Af- 
ter repeated measures had been enforced against him, 
some of them military and violent, all equally indica- 
tive of the displeasure of the Government and their de- 



4 

cided purposes in regard to him ; after he had once been 
sent to England in 1628, and had returned to Mount 
Wollaston, or, as Governor Bradford somewhere says, 
to " his old nest at Merry Mount," the name he had 
himself given it, we find a record left in these words, 
" September 7, 1630, Second Court of Assistants held 
at Charlestown. Present, Governor Winthrop, Deputy 
Governor Dudley, Sir Richard Saltonstall and others. 
Ordered, ' That Thomas Morton of Mount Wollaston 
shall presently be set in the bilbowes, [long bars or 
bolts of iron used to confine the feet of prisoners and 
offenders on board ships,] and after sent to England by 
the ship called the Gift, now returning thither : that all 
his goods shall be seized to defray the charge of his 
transportation, payment of his debts, and to give satis- 
faction to the Indians for a canoe he took unjustly from 
them, and that his house be burnt down to the ground 
in sight of the Indians, for their satisfaction for many 
wrongs he has done them.' " * 

This was enforced, and in pursuance of the order 
he was again sent to England. But his annoyances 
did not end here. He urged complaints to the king, 
which were likewise sources of difficulty : he returned 
again to Mount Wollaston, and afterwards in repeated 
forms disturbed and harassed the colony, so that at 
last, as Hutchinson says, " Nothing but his age saved 
him from the whipping-post." f He died at Agamen- 
ticus — the town of York, in the state of Maine, about 
1643 — if not in obscurity, as he resolved not to die, 
at least in disgrace, and to the promotion of the public 
tranquillity. 

* Prince's Chronology, Vol. I. p. 248. 

t Hutchinson's History, Vol. I. p. 32, London Edition, Note. 



A source of still more ardent and general excitement, 
if possible, to the people of those early times, was the 
supposed heretical preaching of Mr. John Wheelwright, 
a connexion in kindred, and a zealous friend in opinion 
of the memorable and gifted Mrs. Anne Hutchinson. 
To some, this latter circumstance was of far deeper 
interest than the preceding one, as, in their view, no 
radicalism in politics, no disorderly conduct could com- 
pare with heresy on that absorbing topic, to which 
their eyes and hearts were so steadily directed. This 
gentleman came out and ministered to the people of 
the Mount, by the permission, if not at the instigation 
of the First Church in Boston, as early as 1636 — the 
residents here, on account of their distance from Bos- 
ton, having previously petitioned to have the benefit of 
a preacher. The chief excitement, which with all 
innocence, and sincerity of purpose, too, he seems to 
have been the cause of brewing u[), was that apparently 
simple thing, the preaching of a Fast sermon. Already 
the clergy, as a body, and some of the laity had begun 
to look upon him with fearful and suspicious eyes. 
But the larger portion of the laity, we have reason to 
think, went not a little beyond an ordinary sympathy 
with him. It was in consonance with what, in my 
opinion, was the prevalent spirit of the times, as, with 
your patience, in the sequel we may hope to see illus- 
trated. He was apparently an innovator and reformer : 
he took one step aside from the trodden way ; and the 
conservatives sounded the trumpet of alarm. His 
seemingly humble instrument, the Fast sermon, set the 
whole community into a blaze. From such small be- 
ginnings do great things grow. Thus does God choose 
the weak things of the world to confound the things 



that are mighty. He was pursued and arraigned, dis- 
franchised and banished. Fortunate in his time, that 
he came off even thus hghtly, and escaped the block. 
A little earlier period would have counted him less 
venial. A slighter matter, persisted in with the firmness 
he manifested, might but shortly before his day have 
crowned him with the honors of martyrdom. 

It comes within my present plan only to take this 
passing notice of Mr. Wheelwright, and the excitement 
which followed him, as one of the remarkable events, 
which had taken place previously to the incorporation 
of the town. This event alone would afford an almost 
interminable field for remark and discussion, were it 
to be pursued, and more than absorb all the time I 
ought to claim on the present occasion. Inviting as 
it is, I leave it with the less regret, as it has recently 
been so ably and satisfactorily presented to the public 
in the discourses * consequent upon the return of the 
second century since the gathering of the first church, 
to which its further consideration might in every view 
appear more pertinent. 

Other incidents likewise are to be noticed of inferior 
but still not very slight consequence, considering the 
circumstances of the times. Intimately connected with 
much that has already been stated, and in part the 
cause of it, were first the highly probable fact, that 
after the departure of Wollaston, some of his company 
had become stationary at the Mount, thus affording us, 
at least, the venerable distinction of being the oldest 
permanent t settlement in Massachusetts; and secondly, 
the indisputable fact, that men both of eminence and 

* See Lunt's Second Century Discourses, 
t See Winthrop's Journal, Vol. I. p. 43. 



industry came out here from the metropolis and had 
allotments of land made to them, already cleared and in- 
viting their labors, and thus giving us the less question- 
able distinction of having had some of the earliest, if 
not the very earliest, cultivated farms in the colony, 
possibly in New England. These all rendered the 
Mount conspicuous — lifting it up before the eyes of 
the sparse community far above its humble physical 
elevation. It had early a name, notoriety, and charac- 
ter. It was a cherished spot both to the Bostonians, 
to whom in fact it belonged, being by order of court 
early annexed to it, and to the magistrates and the 
early settlers generally. 

Accordingly, the way was naturally and easily and 
early prepared for an application, on the part of the 
residents here, and for a ready acquiescence on the 
part of the magistrates, that the inhabitants at Mount 
Wollaston should be incorporated into a town. The 
benefits of such a measure must be too obvious to be 
enlarged upon. It it natural that we should turn with 
some curiosity and interest to the early document — to 
wit, the petition which was presented to this effect. 
No very musty antiquarian fondness would seem to be 
essential in order to reap gratification from its perusal. 
But that privilege is denied us. It has shared the fate 
of many more valuable things. It is not extant. 

In the first volume of the Massachusetts Colony Rec- 
ords, under date of 13 May, 1640, is the following 
account of the action that was had in reply to the ap- 
plication from the Mount. 

" The Petition * of the Inhabitants of Mount Wool- 

* Massachusetts Colony Records, Vol. 1. p. 277. 



8 

laston was voted and granted them to be a Town ac- 
cording to the agreement with Boston ; provided, that 
if they fulfil not the covenant made with Boston and 
hearto affixed, it shall be in the power of Boston to 
recover their due by action against the said inhabitants 
or any of them, — and the town is to be called Brain- 
tree." 

Pretty rigid principle this, on which to base their 
conditions, whatever the amount or extent of those 
conditions might have been ! It was, in fact, the very 
principle, involving the question, which, in our own 
time, has been mooted, with so much earnestness and 
cogent reasoning on both sides, whether individuals 
shall be holden for the liabilities of the corporation, of 
which they are a component part. 

It is not necessary to quote these conditions, extend- 
ing to considerable length, and being rather minute. 
They are principally the payment of certain yearly 
assessments on special parcels of land. One item it is 
curious at this distant day to observe. Boston resigns* 
to Braintree, probably as hardly worth the keeping, the 
rocky hill extending west from where we are assembled, 
far into the granite quarries, " together with another 
parcel of rocky ground near to the Knight's Neck." 

* The language of the record runs thus, — " All that rocky ground lying 
between the Fresh brook and Mr. Coddington's brook, adjoining to Mr. 
Hough's farm, and from the west corner of that farm to the southmost cor- 
ner of Mr. Hutchinson's farm, to be reserved and used in common forever." 
Mr. Coddington's farm, we know, was the present Mount Wollaston farm. 
Where Mr. Hutchinson's farm was we have no means of determining. But 
guided by the two brooks mentioned, in all probability the two principal 
ones which pass through the town at the present day, I have supposed the 
parcel alluded to would be likely to lie in the direction stated. If I am 
right in this conjecture it included Mount Ararat, (so called,) with the hilly 
portion stretching south of it as far as the brook. 



9 

It was reserved for a period, long after their very 
names had passed from among men, amidst the growing 
improvements of advancing time, to affix to the worth- 
less rocks a value surpassing all that could have entered 
their imagination. 

The origin of the name of our ancient town, as thus 
incorporated, is traced in this way. In 1632, accord- 
ing to Winthrop,* a company from Braintrcy in Eng- 
land, near Chelmsford, where Mr. Hooker was the 
preacher, begun to settle at Mount Wollaston. They 
removed afterwards to Newton, but, as has been con- 
jectured, it appears to me with good reason.f a part of 
the company must have returned again, perhaps about 
1634, and settled permanently. Unquestionably at 
their request or suggestion, the name of their former 
residence was given to the new place of their adop- 
tion. 

It is far from common, I suppose, that in the division of 
towns, the movement for separation occurs with the old 
settlement. Such, however, was the fact here ; and in 
the issue, whether from necessity or not, the ancient 
name was resigned and the present one was taken, in 
honor of Colonel John Quincy, who had occupied the 
Mount Wollaston farm. As we have come up, howev- 
er, to commemorate the original incorporation, there 
seems a special propriety in doing it where the first 
settlement and incorporation were actually made, rather 
than follow the name to a spot where only a feeble 
settlement, if any, had been begun, and no church 
gathered till more than half a century afterwards. 

* See Winthrop's New England, p. 87, note by Savage, 
t See Lunt's Second Century Discourses, Appendix, p. 66. 

2 



10 

I now take leave of the history, which, commencing 
with the period to which I have arrived, has been stead- 
ily accumulating for two hundred years, and pass to 
other considerations, of a more practical bearing, and in 
which we shall be far more likely to find some end. 
It would be as preposterous as it would be fearfully 
tedious, to pursue the history through all the details of 
two centuries, down to the present hour. This is more 
properly the work of the annalist. Let us turn, there- 
fore, to matters of a more comprehensive character. 

And here we may well remark how little history in gen- 
eral has done to elevate our conceptions of man. Some- 
thing it could hardly fail to accomplish of good, as from 
age to age it affords us records of what advancement has 
been made upon the past. But it tells us little of hu- 
man capacity. It is, for the most part, the dismal cat- 
alogue of man's animal conflicts, and the exhibition of 
his worst passions. War, conquest, ambitious tri- 
umphs, purchased at the cost of wholesale suftering ; 
selfish accumulation at the expense of monstrous and 
revolting miseries, awful and unjust impositions ; these, 
and the things like them, are what stand out glaringly 
on its pages. It does no justice to the better part of 
man. It is no index in itself alone of what he is des- 
tined to accomplish. He who looks to history in the 
light of so many facts only, as so many items alone in 
the amount of mortal action, and takes them for his 
guide, will be about certain to err. He must of neces- 
sity be narrow in his expectations of human advance- 
ment. The true philosopher will go behind history 
and analyze the picture it presents, find its real ele- 
ments, and place them in their rightful order. He will 
sift out the chaff, and set down to the lower propensi- 



ties what belongs exclusively to them. After wading 
through a century of disheartening events, he will not, 
therefore, grow hopeless of man ; for he can perceive 
that scarcely one of the higher powers of his nature 
has been called into action. Man has not himself 
been before him, but the deformity of man, which we 
may justly complain history has been so lavish in por- 
traying. 

Hence the difference among men in their visions of 
the future. One takes history for his exclusive guide, 
its bare, dark chapters. Another takes his stand upon 
principles — the elements and capacities of human na- 
ture, what man was evidently designed by his Creator to 
be. Can we doubt how meagre, unsatisfactory, and delu- 
sive in comparison history thus becomes ? An Egyptian 
colony, we are told, planted Athens ; a band of robbers 
and outcasts laid the foundations of Rome, — her sons 
in time left Carthage a heap of ashes, and transferred 
her glory to the beautiful Italian shores. William the 
Conqueror invaded and overran Britain ; the Turks, 
during more than double the centuries we have had a 
name on the earth, planted their feet with a gigantic 
power on the neck of Grecian valor, refinement, and 
unsurpassed literary fame ; meanwhile the mighty sway, 
and the feeble are ground in the dust. Where do we 
get the intimation that the feeble band of the Puritans, 
at very sight of whom the imposing court of Charles 
curl their lips in scorn, shall one day push off to these 
ends of the earth, and here kindle up on new principles 
the dawn of a better hope for man ? The convents of 
the middle ages, the castle-crowned cliffs of Lords and 
Barons ministered, in part, to the physical wants of 
the human race. It was their pride and glory that the 



12 

beggar knocked never at their gates in vain. But 
nothing was done, nothing even attempted to lift the 
unfortunate or the indigent above the necessity of beg- 
gary. Let him, who counts history thus all-sufficient, 
lay his finger upon those hopeful premises, whence we 
may safely make the glad deduction that, far in the 
distant future, a better almsgiving shall call forth the 
sympathies of humanity, — that all their bounties and 
charity shall look poor and shallow, the merest surface 
work by the side of a truer benevolence, which, strik- 
ing deeper than physical want, aims at individual self- 
respect and social elevation. 

Nevertheless, history in its place is not to be dis- 
paraged. It has its lessons, and it is fruitful of instruc- 
tion. Only let not man grow faithless under it. They 
who left the smiling scenes of England, and built up in 
this wilderness, first the humble towns, and, through 
their growing strength, our present wide domain, till 
" the little one has become a thousand, and the small 
one a strong nation," came forth here and conquered 
and took the victory, as had been done times without 
number before. History records for us their doings, 
fortunately also some of the elevated objects at which 
they were aiming. What was there in their coming 
forth here, and in the prosperity that has followed them, 
differing from those of all other conquests or coloniza- 
tions ? Let us briefly look into this, and trace, as I 
think we may, to the same cause the success of their 
enterprise at the beginning, and the surpassing pros- 
perity that has risen up to honor their memories since. 

If we step for a moment behind history and look at 
it as it passes before us, we shall perceive that there have 
been two preeminently distinct and prominent classes of 



13 

principles, which have prevailed among men, and by 
which communities and the world in general have been 
swayed. These are the binding and the dissevering 
principles, founded the one upon the moral sentiments, 
the other upon the animal propensities in man. 
Neither of these has as yet ever existed, without 
any alliance with the other. The latter has pre- 
vailed in by far the largest measure. The binding 
principles, founded as they are upon the moral sen- 
timents, have reference to the everlasting laws of 
rectitude, and to a conformity with the will and de- 
signs of the Creator. The dissevering principles,, 
on the contrary, founded upon what is low, are shallow, 
superficial, extraneous, — they are attendant upon ar- 
bitrary will or artificial circumstances or temporary 
necessity, or what is worse, error, folly, ignorance, or 
crime. Thus, for example, all the principles which go 
to the support of a despotism are dissocial, dissevering, 
and shattering in their very nature. They tend natur- 
ally and inevitably to nurture passions and promote 
objects, which must as certainly divide men, as a decree 
of fate. They set one against another, and bring on 
opposing interests and factions, weakness and downfall. 
On one side, the side of the despot, there are pride, 
arrogance, indolence, oppression, inordinate selfishness, 
the idea of inherited or inahenable right over the prop- 
erty, persons, freedom, and happiness of others ; and 
on the other, the side of the overpowered, envy and 
hatred, the desire of hberty, the chafing feeling of rights 
trampled on and human nature abused. In these there 
is no permanent germ, no bond of union. They can 
no more coexist eternally, they can no more draw 
naturally and willingly in any harmonious fellowship, 



14 

than the hungry tiger can gambol with the lamb. 
Those principles, on the contrary, which are at the 
foundation of a true republic, are naturally binding ; 
never as yet, indeed, have we seen them anything like 
generally prevailing, or freely and fully acted out. 
Whenever we do see them, we shall find them exercis- 
ing this influence ; as far as we witness them at all, 
we perceive this to be their character ; — and reason- 
ably, for their object is to call out individual action in 
its legitimate and noblest sphere, and to respect, de- 
velop, defend all human rights. The disconnection 
of religion from the state, the union of taxation and 
representation, the right of private judgment, the prin- 
ciple of toleration, and in morals the principle of doing 
unto others what we would wish they should do to us, — 
these all are binding principles. The more they get 
into operation, the more will they cement men and 
prosper their union, — fixing their eyes and hearts on 
one common good, the highest happiness, the greatest 
and universal elevation of the human race. 

Taking this key with us, the history of the past as- 
sumes a new face. We read it with an alphabet that 
makes it intelligible. It is not only not discouraging, 
but crowded with lessons of w^arning, with incitements 
to new eftbrt, and hopeful promises of good. What 
cause for wonder, so often expressed, when we look 
back to nations or cities of antiquity, and perceive that 
under seemingly prosperous circumstances, fortune 
smiling, they could not be held together beyond a cer- 
tain point, — that after a time they have shattered to 
pieces like some vast edifice, outwardly adorned, but 
within which the perilous elements of explosion have 
been all the while concealed, ready fuel for the fatal 



15 

spark ! Tlie truth was, their overthrow and downfall 
were inevitable; — in most instances, because the 
prominent principles by which they were governed 
were dissocial, not only not binding, but altogether dis- 
severing. And in the same connexion, though in a 
different sphere, we see why it was that such a man 
US Howard could go on his self-devoted mission and 
fullil it so well, why it was that success and triumph 
seemed so marvellously to run before him, that, in the 
striking language of the Scriptures, he appeared " to 
have power to tread on serpents and scorpions and 
over all the power of the enemy, nothing by any 
means hurting him." It was because his whole heart 
and soul were allied with, and all he did was done upon 
these binding principles, — principles, which draw men 
to one common object, the sublimest services that can 
engage the human soul, and cement all their sympa- 
thies, hopes, and affections with it. 

If now, we inquire again what there was in the 
coming out of the first settlers of New England so dis- 
tinctive and lio})oful in its very nature, — if we ask, 
again, what was the peculiar character of the seed here 
sown, whence sprung up these flourishing towns, 
whence came ihe unparalleled prosperity, which in less 
than two centuries, nay in far less than one, converted 
a wilderness into more than a blooming garden, here 
we find the reply. It was their alliance with these 
elevating principles, blessed by the overruling Provi- 
dence of God, which did it all. Coiled up here, lay 
hidden, as I conceive, the great moving spring, which 
first drove our fathers from their pleasant abodes, and 
founded here these new manifestations of freedom and 
hope. It was the same, which, as it gradually uncoiled. 



16 

gave a new impulse to human action, scattered far and 
wide hitherto unimagined blessings, and handed down 
to distant ages an inheritance surpassing — with the 
exception of Christianity, of which it might be called 
in part a new development — surpassing in value the 
most precious legacy of the past. 

It might be useful, only that it would lead me into 
too wide a field, to consider somewhat in detail, by 
what operation of their opposites these better princi- 
ples gradually found root in the hearts of the Puritans, 
and by what oppressions and excesses our fathers grew 
more and more enamored of them, till they found an 
asylum and a new sphere for them here. In their day 
and previously to their day, the selfish and dissevering 
principles had gained almost entire sway in their own and 
other lands. The civil, moral and religious, and intel- 
lectual aspect of the times were each and all singularly 
odious and hateful. All refinement had a low aim. 
Correct modes of philosophizing were buried up under 
metaphysical obscurities. Expansive -and elevated prin- 
ciples were wanting. Few, if any, among the higher 
elements of man, were recognised as having any foun- 
dation in himself. Rehgion was practically regarded 
as an outward mechanism, to be used only for worldly 
purposes. To complete the dark picture, the civil 
power came down in the form of infringements upon 
property and personal liberty. Those unpleasant min- 
isters, those unconciliating peace-makers, confiscation 
and imprisonment, torture and the stake, were every- 
where busy. Wisdom above man's overruled them all 
for good. Strange to tell, their very contraries grew 
up on the uncongenial soil. Out of adversity gems of 
virtues glistened brightly. The old curse was again 



17 

a blessing ; find in these elevated principles they took 
retiige with high and animating hope. 

It has been common to ascribe the first movement of 
the founders of New England, and their subsequent 
action and success to religion ; and in its very broadest 
acceptation, undoubtedly, this term would embrace the 
wide circle of incitements by which they were moved. 
But let us beware lest, in our application of it, we fail 
to do justice to all their springs of action. Religion 
has been narrowed, and made a technical thing. Little 
else does it express to the minds of many but the un- 
folding and right direction of the sentiment of rever- 
ence alone. It speaks to them only of pious sentiments, 
and ati'ectionate and confiding trust in God. They had 
all these, but they had more. The Jews present to us 
a remarkable specimen of this sort of development. 
The devotional and pious element, — religion in this 
restricted sense was signally displayed in their char- 
acter. But what did they comparatively accomplish, 
even with all this, in the way of civil and social in- 
stitutions, in the sense of laying the foundation of a 
comprehensive and enduring national prosperity? AVhat 
have the various tribes and nations accomplished, — 
the long catalogue of whom we need not stop to re- 
capitulate, — in whom the same element has predomi- 
nated ? We may readily reply, without injustice, little 
or nothing. Contrast the founders of New England 
with such as these, and how obvious is it that by such 
an estimate we reach to no adequate appreciation of 
their wide spirit, their far reaching principles. A much 
nearer approach do we make to it, by saying that they 
were looking to the foundation of a Christian common- 



1 f^ 

lo 

wealth. Tliat end was most assuredly in their hearts, 
and for its accomphshment all that 1 have set forth, as 
their guiding principles, was indispensably necessary. 
It ivas religion, under the direction of which they 
moved, but religion in its most comprehensive sense ; 
reverence presiding over the right development of all 
the higher faculties. Hence the principles, with which 
they were accompanied, all the subsidiary action be- 
came of the character we have been considering. They 
were those binding principles, which elevate at the 
same time that they honor humanity. They were those 
which, in proportion as they prevail in their perfection, 
give success and permanency to any undertaking. 

Mighty principles these ! And yet say now, ye who 
calculate the chances of success of human enterprises, 
say, what chances have these exiles as the dim outhne 
of their loved land fades from their view ! By all 
worldly calculation, they would be set down as destined 
to certain and irretrievable failure. So might we say 
of almost every great undertaking, in which man has 
ever engaged. Judged by the maxims of worldly pru- 
dence, scarcely one great achievement of all the myri- 
ads that man has brought to pass, would have been 
marked antecedently with any likelihood of success. 
But tested by the principles on which we perceive the 
Pilgrims started, we see good reason why beginnings 
so inauspicious as theirs have grown so illustrious ; 
and, on the other hand, why schemes, that arrayed on 
their side wealth and power and numbers and public 
opinion, have dwindled into insignificance, and left no 
other trace that they ever were, but the story of their 
early promise and almost as early and signal defeat. 



19 

We * are not to look back to the Pilgrims, even in 
all our admiration of what they were and what they 
did, with the expectation of finding a full and perfect 
exemplification of the principles, the general character 
of which have rendered them and their cause so illus- 
trious. They manifested them, perhaps, about as fully 
as could be expected from humanity, under their cir- 
cumstances. Their perfect manifestation would have 
realized the Utopian commonwealth. They gave their 
hearts to the higher order of principles, the highest that 
can actuate the souls of men, — and that was enough. 
That they were not perfect only reminds us that they 
were mortal. They took hold of principles in sympa- 
thy with man's better elements, principles that had 
been despised and rejected of men, and with their ad- 
herence to them the institutions of society could not 
but be remodelled and safely founded. They poured a 
fresh spirit into religion by claiming the rights of con- 
science ; and even cramped, as it undeniably was, it 
stood forth among them as if raised from the dead. 
They defended the principle of self government, and 
vested the right of electing their own magistrates in 
the hands of the people. This also breathed into the 
civil condition the breath of life. They recognised all 
the right of individual action they felt to be consist- 
ent with safety ; and that set all the wheels of industry 
in motion, on which public prosperity relies so much. 
They drew out the religious sentiment, and kept it 
uppermost like a presiding Deity. They founded the 
free schools, and thus rocked an infant Hercules as 



* This and the next paragrnph, on account of the unavoidable length of 
the Discourse, were omitted in the delivery. 



20 

among the first-born children ol' the youthful coiunion- 
wealth. 

We may pardon some few imperfections to men 
who in a dark age could accomplish such things as 
these. Is it asked, why they could not have carried 
out some of their professed principles a little more 
fully, — toleration, for example ? " Tolerate ! tolerate 
whom ? " let me reply in the words of a descendant of 
one of the first settlers of the Mount and some of the 
earliest natives of this ancient town, whose name has 
been given to our soil, " Tolerate whom ? the legate 
of the Roman Pontiff, or the emissary of Charles the 
First and Archbishop Laud ? How consummate would 
have been their folly and madness, to have fled into 
the wilderness to escape the horrible persecutions of 
those hierarchies, and at once to have admitted into 
the bosom of their society men brandishing and ready 
to apply the very flames and fetters from which they had 
fled ! Those, who are disposed to condemn them on 
this account, neither realize the necessities of their 
condition, nor the prevailing character of the times. 
Under the stern discipline of Ehzabeth and James, the 
stupid bigotry of the first Charles, and the spiritual 
pride of Archbishop Laud, the spirit of the English 
hierarchy was very diflerent from that which it assumed, 
when, after having been tamed and humanized under 
the wholesome discipline of Cromwell and his common- 
wealth, it yielded itself to the mild influence of the prin- 
ciples of 1688, and to the liberal spirit of Tillotson."" 
VVe would honor the memories of those, who first 
trod these shores, and founded our towns in all their 

" Quincy's Ccntcniiinl Address, Boston, }>. 26. 



21 

allegiance to these elevating and binding principles. 
We would honor their patience and perseverance, their 
magnanimous endurance and trust in God, in all the 
days of darkness and discouragement they saw, of 
which there were many. And we would devoutly bless 
God, that to causes so honorable to themselves, so 
elevating and enduring in their very nature, we may 
trace the success that crowned their day of small things, 
their feeble but magnanimous enterprise. 

If now we have been able to find an interpretation 
to the prosperity that attended the original enterprise 
of our Fathers, in the very principles on which they 
started, equally also to the same cause are we to ascribe 
the rapid growth of the towns, which soon sprung up 
upon their footsteps, and the almost startling and con- 
stantly accelerating progress they have made since in 
all that improves and honors man. 

1. In the first place, as to their government. It was 
the same order of principles, carried out into practice 
here, that bound them together and gave them stability. 
Actually it might seem it could be no otherwise at the 
first ; for the very men, who in the beginning brought 
to this wilderness the principles we have been consid- 
ering, were those who peopled the ancient towns. 
They must be expected to breathe the spirit of the 
principles they cherished. But in this we overlook the 
important distinction between being merely resident in 
the towns, — the general government being, mean- 
while, administered over all, — and the transmission of 
all the vital principles they held so sacred, so far as 
they could be transmitted, down to the towns them- 
selves. In a word, it would have been one thino-, as it 



22 

might have been, to have made the towns actual de- 
pendencies, — subject in every particular to the dis- 
cretion and management of the general government, 
having their officers all appointed by authority, amount 
of taxes fixed and assessed abroad, enactments passed 
as to the regulation of all matters connected with public 
roads, instruction, and so forth, descending to the very 
lowest details, — and another thing, as it was, to com- 
mit all this to their entire management and control, 
with an undoubting confidence as to the wisdom and 
success of entrusting it to their care. 

In doing this, the very principles were put in action 
in all the towns for which the Pilgrims had crossed the 
ocean. The roots of the liberty they sought to realize 
went down to the smallest communities among them. 
It was the right they claimed of governing themselves, 
and having a voice in every law they were called to 
obey, which was the one thing essential, the beginning, 
middle, and end of their civil prosperity. We see its 
good effects in its cementing and elevating character, 
turn where we will, in their early history ; — nowhere 
are these good effects more apparent than in the grow- 
ing prosperity of the towns. The prevalence of this 
principle, in particular, — and of a similar character, 
more or less, were all upon which they acted, — tended 
to make at once a common interest for all. It served 
as a stimulant upon individual exertion. Where each 
one does something to determine measures, and who 
shall enforce them, it is natural that each one should 
feel some incitement and call to that service. It is 
natural that, in devising the best means of bringing 
about desirable objects, the higher intellectual qualities 
should be called forth and exercised, such as invention, 



23 

prudence, and forethought. A generous spirit and 
hberal views spring up hkewise in the same connexion 
and from the same cause, — and in every byway where 
we trace its operation, the principle becomes a bless- 
ing. Hence it is, that accumulating funds and legacies, 
whether for schools or religious institutions, become so 
often dead weights upon a community; not so much by 
any direct influence of evil, as because they go, — pre- 
cisely in proportion to the ground they cover, — to 
palsy all those qualities in man, which ought to be roused 
to do for the community just that amount they are 
trying to do for them. The real good in the world is 
accomplished by individual exertion and sacrifice ; and 
these the free principles, planted in all our towns, have 
been singularly well calculated to draw out. 

Now all these qualities, thus stirred into action, are 
the sure elements of prosperity. The rocky and sterile 
soil of New England, — girdled almost uninterruptedly 
by breakers on the sea and mountains on the main, — 
whose natural productions, as has been strikingly saidy 
are nothing but rocks and ice, yet dotted all over with 
these flourishing communities, most satisfactorily cor- 
roborates the assertion. It is vain to place man under 
the most genial sky, and amid all the favorable circum- 
stances of outward condition, warm suns and balmy 
breezes and a fruitful soil, without those manly quali- 
ties, which enable him to make them tributary to great 
ends; and on the contrary, with these, what are the 
most forbidding and dreary wildernesses but the fields 
of his prosperity and glory ? Let some of the sunny 
Italian lands with their lazy, stupid, decaying popula- 
tion attest the first. Our own time-honored municipal- 
ity, imbedded in her granite quarries, with her long and 



24 

flourishing sisterhood, tiie smihiig towns of New Eng- 
land, shall be the diagram for the last. 

" Man is the nobler growth our realms supply, 
And souls are ripened in our northern sky." 

2. So much for the principles, which have entered 
into the government of the towns. Then next in rela- 
tion to their social interests. Some provision must be 
made to foster these, or any community will dwindle 
away. Instead of taking a prosperous course, it will 
in time die out. Our progenitors took the most decid- 
edly eftectual measures towards this object, that human 
ingenuity could devise, and by doing nothing, actually 
did everything. They might, indeed, be said to have 
taken oft' all the old impediments and restrictions, 
which had been previously wound round the social 
condition, as if artfully contrived to put an end to all 
healthy circulation, inasmuch as they never, for a mo- 
ment, renewed, on this side of the water, what had 
been amply tested to their satisfaction on the other. 
But it was only in such a sense that they could be said 
to have done anything. They virtually left the social 
condition to itself Ihcy gave it all it asked, — the 
field of a fair opportunity. 

It was a wide stride in the advancement of human 
affairs, and in the elevation of the social condition, thus 
to do nothing. With the laws already based upon jus- 
tice, and looking to the support of equal rights, all the 
fruits of industry were at once made secure and per- 
manent ; — all property, in short, however acquired, 
became sacred and sale. Beyond this, to drop all the 
old [)rops of society, the crazy framework on which 
they had relied so much, wasting their energies in sus- 
taining what, instead of strengthening, only made soci- 



25 

ety the weaker, was, we must confess, in their day, an 
experiment, as bold as to the philosophic eye it was 
profound, as in the event it has proved successful. 
What mad scheme would you be venturing upon? 
might have inquired the crafty politician of those 
times, — and the inquiry would not have sounded either 
shallow or unmeaning, — what mad scheme would you 
be venturing upon, thus to cut loose from the protect- 
ing laws, the safe mooring places of primogeniture and 
entail ? What will become of all the family distinctions 
of wealth and power, we have found so essential to pre- 
serve the jTOvernment and the social state what it is? 
Hold on, — rather the more firmly amidst the gathering 
commotions that are brewing up, — to what time has 
proved such efficient instruments to check and regulate 
human affairs. — Unfortunately, they have checked and 
regulated us a little too much, — might have been the 
sagacious reply, — and that too at the cost of the real 
interest and happiness of those who have been only 
dreaming that they were served. In reality, all of us 
have fared alike. All of us have sufiered. The social 
circulations have been dead. We want free action. 
Let us lay the social foundations anew. Let us put 
them on the free exercise of the native sentiments of 
the soul. — There they were laid. There they have 
prospered. 

In this result, in this new experiment of the Pilgrims, 
we come back again to the prevalence of the same 
elevated and binding principles which governed them 
from the first, and all along. The towns flourished un- 
der these new social privileges. The sympathies of 
men were called out, we might almost say, as they had 
never before been in the history of Christian civiliza- 
4 



26 

tion. There was nothing to impede or counteract 
them. They were free. They worked spontaneously. 
If to any one thing more than another we are to as- 
cribe the healthy and unexampled growth of the towns, 
I know not to what we could turn more readily than to 
this. Lay back, at this hour, upon the most prosperous 
of these communities, the old burden of social embar- 
rassments, and who can doubt, for one moment, their 
certain and rapid decay ? 

3. Then, too, in still another department, — never 
to be overlooked or forgotten, — may we trace, in the 
growth and prosperity of our towns, the prevalence and 
operation of the same exalted and elevating principles. 
The system that was early adopted for the diffusion 
of good learning ; and the means that were taken to 
develop and direct the religious sentiment, were alike 
honorable to our Fathers, and fruitful of unspeakable 
blessings to their posterity. We sometimes lose sight 
of the actual dimensions of great privileges enjoyed; — 
on the one hand, by our familiarity with their constant 
contributions to our comfort or prosperity ; and on 
the other, by never ceasing panegyric or fulsome eulo- 
gy. Let us take care that neither of these makes us 
insensible to the institutions in question. Let me not 
be thought especially to be falling in with any formal 
commendation. If nmch has been said, in times past, 
on these topics, it has been because they could right- 
fully claim so much. In connexion with all their other 
wise provisions, these prospective measures, — for be- 
yond dispute they were eminently that, — stood out 
foremost, and engaged their most devoted attention. 
They sprung beyond the narrow calculations of utility. 
They were neither bread, nor houses, nor weapons of 



27 

defence against their ever watchful and insidious foes. 
The first settlers could hardly be said to have required 
these institutions for themselves, — certainly not those 
for the promotion of learning. Their great distinction 
was that they came charged with the treasures of learn- 
ing, — an overflowing stock for the youthful common- 
wealth. But they looked forward to the generations 
that were to follow on after them. Or rather, let us 
say, actuated by higher considerations still, feeling the 
strong claims and necessity of disciplining and storing 
the mind, impressed with the infinite importance of re- 
ligion to human well-being, they gave expression to 
these convictions. Their anticipations were far-reach- 
ing and hopeful, we know ; but there were deeper 
fountains in their own souls than they. They did their 
duty to themselves, and confided in God that their 
fruits would appear in their children. So it came to 
pass that in poverty and straits they built their churches 
and supported their ministers, established the free 
schools and founded the university. 

The fruits, for which they trusted in God, have ap- 
peared in their children. In those fruits the towns 
have been strong and prosperous. Of what avail were 
all other blessings without the fruits of these institu- 
tions ? What were all our glorious rivers, our granite 
hills, our mines of coal, our protecting harbors, open- 
ing into the wide bosom of the ocean, and ready to 
lay the treasures of distant climes into the lap of the 
stretching main, — what were industry, toiling from 
early morn till latest eve, without mind directing all 
these, and intelhgent enterprise turning them into a 
richer value, a truer worth, than Peruvian gold ? The 
free schools, aided by the higher institutions and col- 



28 

leges, have done this, and far more than I may even 
hint at, throughout New England. And of what avail 
were all the acuteness of intellect, all the unfolded 
powers and stored wisdom of the mind, unsanctitied by 
higher considerations, — unless guarded, made safe 
and strong by moral and religious influences ? Possibly 
might they prove only the greater curse. The sons of 
the Pilgrims, in these our towns, have fully exemplified 
the worth of these institutions. Nothing can be truer 
than the assertion often made and in many forms, that 
these institutions have cost us nothing. They have 
borrowed nothing, they have not more than twice over 
paid back. But rising above all such considerations as 
these is the more grateful and ennobling reflection, 
that from the churches of New England has shone 
forth a steady light, guiding her sons in all their homes 
and walks, and opening to their aspiring vision a higher 
world [beyond the sorrows and allurements of this. 

I have spoken of the character of the principles, by 
which the first settlers of New England were actuated, 
in their original enterprise, on their fidelity to which, 
under the smdes of a beneficent Providence, their suc- 
cess was founded ; and to the prevalence of the same 
order of principles have traced the prosperity of our 
towns. In their growing and flourishing condition, 
New England herself has been honored. With the 
matron of old, presenting them as her offspring, she has 
been ready to exclaim, " these, these are my jewels." 

On a day like this, when the children of this our 
household have gathered home, — when, with a filial 
reverence and glowing affections we have come to sit 
once more by the family hearth-stone, and to enjoy the 



29 

social pleasures of the paternal birth-day, — when we 
have come to mingle our gladness and our grief to- 
gether in many of the proud and happy, no less than 
the tender and atibcting remembrances of the past, we 
shall be indulged, I trust, without the accusation of an 
attempt to glorify the family name, in recurring, as a 
dutiful service, to some of the venerable portraits that 
honor our walls, whose lives were eminent in their day, 
and many of whose names have become illustrious in 
the history of the world. 

In doing this, we may well rejoice that we still keep 
Avithin the circle of the elevated principles that have 
guided us thus far. It has been by their adherence to 
whatever is ennobling in man, to whatever meliorates 
and exalts the human condition, devotion to freedom 
and truth and God, that the native and adopted sons of 
this ancient town have earned the laurels of their fame 
and become eminent, some of them, in all the earth. 
To us have they bequeathed an imperishable renown, — 
our least return will be to call up their names, that we 
may pay some feeble tribute to their memories. Let 
us begin with the days of the Mount, with John Wheel- 
wright^ the bold and acute thinker. No time-serving 
conformist, no timid one to grow pale before councils 
or decrees. Fit companion for Sir Henry Vane, a re- 
serve in the noble army of martyrs. Honor now to thy 
name, who for thy character and long ministry wouldst 
have been honored at the death, had not thy persecu- 
tors been in power.* — William Coddiiigton, a fellow 
pilgrim with Winthrop, munificent and upright, " with 
the chiefest in all public charges," the friend of Wheel- 

* See Hutchinson. 



30 

Wright, peace-maker, judge, and governor. He should 
be remembered here where he did something for learn- 
ing, and everything for a good example. — Henry Adams. 
Of him little is left to us but his epitaph. That tells us 
that " he took his flight from the Dragon persecution in 
Devonshire in England, and alighted at Mount Wollas- 
ton," (we may add, perhaps as early as 1630.) Would 
that we knew more of the intrepid Pilgrim. But we 
know this, and for this let him be remembered, that a 
century and a half afterwards, he turned round upon 
that Dragon, in his mighty descendant, and bearded 
him in his den. — Edmund Qumcy, dying early, but 
worthy in his youth to be one of the first representa- 
tives of Boston, in the first General Court in the Prov- 
ince. He left those who came after him to complete 
his work, a long line of descendants, the magistrate, 
the judge, officers civil and military, among whom the 
glory of the children were their Fathers. They had 
freedom and the good of the country at heart. It was 
seen in their own doings and in the confidence of the 
people. — Henry Flynt breaks in upon the line, yet allied 
with them in kindred, a descendant of the Godly first 
teacher here. He has the memorable distinction of 
having labored longest on the roll of Harvard, — fellow 
and tutor among her servants and sons. Mirthful yet 
grave, he could mingle the " suaviter in modo with the 
fortiter in re." Preacher and scholar ! thou didst well 
in thy day. — Lemuel Briant, — let us pause here. He 
is not to be passed by as a common name. He stood 
out before his age where there were few to be at his 
side. High authority * pronounced him " the learned, 

* President Adams, sen. 



ii\ 

ingenuous, and eloquent pastor. " He was all that. His 
distant successor assigns him his place to walk with 
Wheelwright in the grand procession of bold and think- 
ing men. Posterity gives him fame in measures his 
own age had no censer they could burn it in. — Next 
comes Richard Cranch, born at the beginning of the 
last century, living into this. His tall person, like his 
upright mind, is still familiar to many of us. He was 
the son of a Puritan, and, in all that made such an one 
great, a Puritan himself. He loved science and adorn- 
ed it. He was a profound theologian in everything 
but the name ; and his life and his practice were better 
than that. Representative, senator, judge among the 
people, his integrity was a rock that could not be mov- 
ed. He was honored by Harvard College, though he 
sat not in her seats or mused in her groves. The pil- 
lar he was, was missed when he fell where few like him 
have been left or risen up. — John Adams follows in the 
order of time, — the bold champion of freedom, the 
asserter of human right, the vindicator of the oppress- 
ed, by the power of his eloquence starting from their 
seats as august an assembly as the world ever saw. 
He was the son of one who served at this communion 
table. He was an ornament to religion and his race, 
faithful to his age and his God, great among the great- 
est. I will add no further feeble words of mine to a 
name that is written where it cannot die. Behold the 
man I approach and read ! " This house will bear 
witness to his piety : This town, his birth-place, to his 
munificence : History to his patriotism : Posterity to 
the depth and compass of his mind." * — The next year 

* By the side of the pulpit, in the First Church, where the present Dis- 
course was delivered, is a mural monument, surmounted by a bust of John 



32 

after him, but not four months younger, is born John 
Hancock, the minister's son : the hterary and pohshed 
gentleman, favorite of the people, liberal merchant, 
eloquent orator, courteous and dignified, representa- 
tive and governor, member of the first congress, presi- 
dent of the second, first to write his name on the mem- 
orable scroll, the Declaration of Independence, where 
it stands bold and finished like his character and man- 
ners. He gave an immortality of littleness to General 
Gage, who sentenced him to condign punishment, and 
denied hiui pardon on any terms as a rebel, by showing 
in his triumphant cause how contemptible was his 
threat. — Eight years more, and there comes the youth- 
ful patriot, Josiah Qiiincy, jr., another in the bright 
line we have already passed, eminent in the law, bold 
for freedom, both as a writer and actor. He stood up 
for justice, with his co-patriot John Adams, amidst the 
furious excitement of the Boston massacre ; a stand as 
fearless as it was righteous. Like Regulus of old, his 
life was given to his country, but in a better way. 
Already enfeebled in health, he died returning from 
England, whither he had privately sailed for her good. 
No cheering tidings fell upon his dying ear, announcing 
her dawninor glories. The battle of Lexington had 
been fought only seven days before. He sleeps in our 
burial yard. Peaceful be his rest ! How befitting him, 
as we dwell upon the memory of his early promise, is 
that exquisite monumental inscription ! 

" Hen ! quanto minus est cum reliquis versari quam tui meminisse." 

Time would fail me to speak of all that might be 

Adams, beneath wliich is an inscription from which the few words quoted 
in the text are taken. 



33 

added to the brilliant constellation, — the eminent dead, 
the more illustrious hving. They will brighten the 
glittering galaxy at last. May they be mentioned with 
more becoming eulogy a hundred years from this day. 

Such are some of the honorable and inspiring remi- 
niscences of the past. There are other emotions that 
cannot but be awakened in us, — tender and more 
aflecting. Two hundred years have passed away since 
the foundation of the town ; and what joyful scenes 
and sorrowful ones have come and gone in all her 
habitations ! Generation after generation have followed 
each other, like wave rolling upon wave, alike swal- 
lowed up together, — but time and its changes have 
neither of them stopped for them, nor have the divine 
appointments been altered or set aside. The cradle 
with its infant smiles, watched over by parental fond- 
ness ; the bridal with its garlands and its hopes, each 
of them rosy and bright ; the grave with its breaking 
hearts and tearful eyes ; sickness with its own pains, 
and the watchful solicitude of those who have bent 
over it ; merry gladness and withering gloom knocking 
side by side at countless doors ; prayers of thanksgiv- 
ing, and prayers imploring comfort, ascending from 
the same and different scenes ; sunny prosperity and 
times that tried the soul ; battle and peace, with all 
their terrors and rejoicings, who shall recount all these ? 
In what thronging numbers do these affecting remem- 
brances thicken round us, as we turn to the scenes of 
home, to the burial yard, to these worshiping courts, 
where in all their varied character they have been acted 
out, — how do they rise to our imaginations, as through 
the dim aisles of the past fancy pictures to us the re- 
treating footsteps of the passing generations ! 
5 



34 

Meanwhile, on a wider tield, what changes have 
been witnessed through the eartli ! For every one that 
landed with Wollaston more than two hundred may 
be ralhed within the limits of the ancient incorporation, 
where three flourishing towns are opening day by day 
new avenues of enterprise and improvement. The 
feeble band of the Pilgrims — feeble only in numbers — 
have swollen to fifteen millions, and twenty-six inde- 
pendent republics have sprung up on the soil where 
they confided their hopes. The despised principles, 
for which they dared and bore everything, have been 
unfolding every hour, in new and more perfect mani- 
festations, winning men to their embrace and practice. 
Intolerance has dropped her unseemly garments, and 
flung away, at least professedly, all her weapons of 
abuse and persecution. Their spirit has gone back 
and reacted upon the old world with its conciliating 
and elevating influences, — awing despotism and lifting 
the burdens of the social condition from despairing 
humanity. The university, on which they doated, 
rears her venerable head, amidst half a hundred, which 
her own sons almost alone have established. Learning 
has found channels for diffusing itself through society, 
of which they never dreamed, and is fast undermining 
social evils and demoralizing recreations, which open 
hostility had only fortified the more. Laws have been 
humanized and simplified, and barbarous and revolting 
practices have been banished from society as degrading 
to Christian men. Art, science, philosophy, into what 
hitherto unexplored regions have they penetrated, since 
the mornino- of New Eui^land first dawned ! what treas- 
ures have they brought back to the waiting generations, 
increasing comfort, lessening toil, contracting the wide 



35 

separations of the human family, scattering inteihgence, 
awakening the higher faculties of man, banishing low 
pursuits and pleasures, and thus directing all their trib- 
utaries to swell the great tide of human improvement 
and progress! 

What remains to us, descendants of the early emi- 
grants, in helping forward this progress, on these shores 
so auspiciously begun, but more and more to copy their 
sympathy with, their allegiance to those higher princi- 
ples, on which their enterprise was built? On our 
fidelity to these depends everything that is ennobling in 
the hopeful anticipations of the future. Nothing great 
or glorious lives, the roots of which have been planted 
in the lower propensities of man. Everything tri- 
umphs at last, which is based upon right, and religion, 
and truth. The applause of the passing hour, the 
shouts of the multitude may give a temporary pros- 
perity to the wrong ; black night may shut down for 
a while round the righteous cause ; — but by the fidelity 
of human endeavor the final consummation is sure, and 
the steady progress towards it is as certain. Fathers of 
New England, may your sons learn this of you ! Let 
the inheritance of your children be your trust in God, 
your never faltering faith in the capacities of man. 
" Thou carriest Caesar," said the world's conqueror to 
the trembling boatman, as he ferried him in fear 
through the perilous tempest ; " never despair with 
such a burden." Thou art bearing forward the pur- 
poses of God, is a nobler reflection, yet appealing to 
the same sentiment, to swell and sustain our souls. 
He, who despairs with such a burden, deserves not to 
know what he carries. Let patience, perseverance, 
and diligence be in all time to come as in all time past 



36 

the cardinal virtues in the land of the Pilgrims. Smitten 
with the memory of the great and good, who have 
lived and labored for our benefit, measuring justly what 
man is and what he has done, watching the steady 
growth of the ages, worshiping the divine power of 
truth, and still more adoringly Him who gives truth its 
power, — thus may we, and those who come after us, 
aim to catch some ennobling sense of the true destiny 
of our race. Springing beyond the fences of our own 
time, living faithfully and hopefully, let us commit the 
cause of man, without a fear, to the advancing genera- 
tions, to the irresistible laws and the presiding care of 
God. 



APPENDIX. 



APPENDIX. 



Measures taken in regard to the Centennial Celebration at Quincy, 
Mass., 25 May, 1840, and the proceedings on that occasion. 

In October and November, 1S39, two or three meetings were 
held by the Town, as may be seen by reference to the Town Rec- 
ords, to take into consideration the propriety and the means of 
celebrating the Two Hundredth Anniversary of the Incorporation 
of the ancient Town in this place, which, dating from 1640, 13th 
May, (old style,) in the course of events was to come round on the 
25lh May, 1840. In the progress of this design, various perplexi- 
ties and inauspicious circumstances occurred, which as they were 
not foreseen could neither in the event be avoided nor surmounted. 
The well intended attempt lingered along, v/ith no final action, and 
there seemed little prospect of getting so far extricated from the 
embarrassment as to arrive at any successful termination. 

At length, as the recurrence of the Anniversary was rapidly 
hastening on, the young men of Quincy were moved to engage in 
the matter, and pursuant to a notice to that effect a meeting was 
held by them, at the Centre District School room, on Monday eve- 
ning, 27th April, 1840, to consider the whole subject. Mr. Caleb 
Gill, jr., was called to preside, and Captain Samuel Wiiite was 
appointed secretary. 

After remarks from several gentlemen, it was resolved to com- 
memorate the return of this interesting event. The following Com- 
mittee of Arrangements was accordingly chosen, namely, John A. 
Green, James F. Brown, Nathan White, Rufus Foster, Alvin 
Rodgers, William Whitney, Edward A. Spear, James Penniman, 
Charles N. Souther, Edwin N. Willet, Waldo Nash, Philip Carver, 



40 

who were instructed to report, at an adjourned meeting, such 
measures as they might deem proper for a suitable observance of 
the day. 

Wednesday evening, 29th April. At the adjourned meeting it 
was recommended by the Committee of Arrangements that the Rev. 
George Whitney of Roxbury, a native of Quincy, be invited to 
deliver a Commemorative Discourse on the approaching interesting 
occasion; which recommendation was unanimously adopted. 

It was also voted to invite the Rev. John Gregory, minister of 
the First Universalist Church in Q,uincy, to deliver an Address to 
the Young Men. 

And upon the suggestion of the Chairman of the Committee of 
Arrangements, it was likewise voted, tluit Mr. Christopher Pearse 
Cranch, a descendant from Quincy, be invited to deliver a Poem 
on the same occasion. 

Other suggestions of the Committee of Arrangements, in refer- 
ence to the observance of the day, were duly considered and adopt- 
ed. Whereupon the meeting was dissolved. 

Caleb Gill, Jr., Moderator. 

Samuel White, Secretary. 

The Committee of Arrangements engaged with alacrity in making 
those preparations which the occasion required, receiving likewise 
such suggestions, as were from time to time offered, with readiness 
and a desire to meet the reasonable wishes of all interested in the 
celebration. The inhabitants of the town, with great unanimity, and 
the natives and descendants, scattered far and wide, more especially 
those in the neighboring metropolis, came forward cordially to the 
good work. A large pavilion was erected on the Hancock Lot, 
capable of accommodating from six to eight hundred people; and 
at the earnest desire very generally expressed of having the Ladies 
at the dinner, such measures were speedily taken as should secure 
their cheering presence and elevating influence on the occasion. 
This circumstance, rather novel in these days, yet marking, we 
think, an era in the progress of Christian civilization, we may well 
hope will be more a matter of course in all public festivities, among 
those who shall assemble to celebrate the third centennial anniver- 
sary. 



41 

Soon alitor the celebration had been decided upon, the following 
notice was published in some of the Boston papers. 

QUINCY CENTENNIAL CELEBRATION. 

Preparations are now making suitably to commemorate the two hundredth 
Anniversary since the incorporation of tlie Town of Braintree, (Quincy 
then being a part of said town, and the place of original settlement,) on 
MONDAY, the 2nth instant. 

The day will be ushered in by a National salute. The procession will 
be formed in the morning, and, after marching through several streets, will 
repair to the Adams Temple, where appropriate Religious services will take 
place, and a Commemorative Discourse be pronounced by the Rev. George 
Whitney, of Roxbury. The Rev. John Gregory, of Quincy, will deliver an 
Address to the Young Men. A Poem will also be given on the occasion, 
by IMr. C. P. Cranch. 

After these exercises, a procession will be formed of the subscribers to 
the Dinner and invited guests, who will then proceed to tlie pavilion 
erected for the occasion. 

The Quincy Light Infantry will perform escort duty, accompanied by an 
excellent Band of Music. 

Tickets for the Dinner may be procured, in Boston, of Jeffrey R. Brackett, 
Gl) Washington Street, and of Farnsworth &- Baxter, Kilby street. Those 
gentlemen, who intend to take tickets for the Dinner, are particularly de- 
sired to purchase them on or before the 22d instant 

The Committee of Arrangements, in compliance with their instructions, 
hereby extend an invitation to the nalives of Quincy and their descendants, 
residing in other places, to unite in the festivities of the occasion. It is to 
be hoped that all the widely scattered sons of Quincy, with their children, 
will again return once more to meet each other at home. 

By order of the Committee of Arrangements, 

JOHN A. GREEN, Chairman. 

James F. Brow.v, Secretary. 

Quincy, May 13, 1*40. 

In consequence of this invitation, a meeting was called by an 
advertisement in the Daily Evening Transcript of May I3th, as 
follows. 

Centknmal, Celebratio.v at Qui.xcy. The citizens of Quincy have 
determined to celebrate the completion of the second Century of the In- 
corporation of that Town, on Monda\', the 25th day of the present month, 
and invite the cooperation of the descendants of that Town, who are now 
located in other places. A meeting of the natives of Quincy and their 
descendants, residing in this city, will be held in the Old Supreme Court 

6 



42 

room, in the Court House in School Street, at 8 o'clock this evening, to 
adopt such measures as may be necessary to aid in this celebration, and 
evince their attachment to this time-honored spot of their origin. 

The result of this meeting comes next in course, and is given as 
it appeared in several of the Boston papers. 

QUINCY CENTENNIAL CELEBRATION. 

Agreeably to a call in the papers of the 13th instant, the natives of 
Quincy and tlieir descendants in Boston assembled at the Old Court House 
in School street. The meeting was called to order by Lewis G. Pray, Esq., 
and organized by the choice of Hon. Josiah Quincy, Jr., for Chairman, and 
Jeffrey R. Brackett, Secretary. Mr. Quincy, on taking the Chair, made 
u short address, and was followed by Charles F. Adams, Esq., who offered 
the accompanying Resolutions, which were unanimously adopted. 

Resolved, That the perpetuation of the principles of freedom in New 
England depends, under God, most upon the extent to which the knowledge 
of the origin and history of tlieir supporters during the period of two centuries 
now elasped since the first settlements, can be generally spread among us. 

Resolved, That no occasions present themselves which can be more fitly 
used for this purpose than commemorations of the anniversaries of the origi- 
nal foundations of tlie various towns of our Commonwealth. 

Resolved, That the citizens of Boston, natives of or otherwise connected 
with Quincy, iiave seen with great pleasure the manifestation on the part 
of tlieir fellow citizens in the latter town of an intention to celebrate in a 
proper manner the 25th day of May, as the day upon which two hundred 
years ago their town Avas originally incorporated ; and that they will cheer- 
fully cooperate with them in all suitable arrangements to promote the 
same. 

Resolved, That a commhtee be appointed from this meeting Avho shall 
have power to communicate with any committee that shall be raised in 
Quincy, and to aid them in making all the necessary preparations Avhich 
are contemplated for the due solemnization of this anniversary. 

In accordance with the last resolution, the following named gentlemen 
were chosen, to constitute a committee : 

Josiah Quincy, Jr., Zabdiel B. Adams, 

Lewis G. Pray, James B. Richardson, 

William Hayden, Benjamin Guild, 

Edward Miller, Charles F. Adams, 

Nathaniel Faxon, Charles Arnold, 

R. C. Greenleaf, Francis Adams, 

William Phipps, Jeffrey R. Brackett. 
Edm<i- Burke Whitney, 



4iS 

After addresses from several gentlemen, among whom were Dr. Adams, 
William Hayden, and Edward Miller, Esqrs., the meeting was adjourned. 

JOSIAH QUINCY, Jr., Chairman. 
Jeffrey R. Brackett, Secretary. 

Information, as to the places wiicre Tickets for tlie Centennial 
Dinner could be procured, was published in the Q,uincy Patriot of 
May 9th, in the annexed 

NOTICE. 

Tickets to the Centennial Dinner will be ready for sale on Tuesday next, 
and may be purchased at the following places; — In Q,uincy, at the stores 
of E. Packard & Co., John Whitney, Justin Spear, Caleb Gill. In Brain- 
tree, at Atherton's store and Arnold's Tavern. In [landolpli (West), How- 
ard's Hotel; (East), Lincoln's store. In Weymouth, Wales's Hotel. In 
Milton, Babcock's store. In Dorchester, Neponset Hotel. In Boston, at 
the stores of Jeffrey R. Brackett, 69 Washington street ; Farnsworth & 
Baxter, in Kilby street. Persons, intending to purchase, are requested to 
do so previously to the Q2d instant. 

Subscription papers were opened both in Quincy and in Jjoston, 
and liberal sums raised to defray the incidental expenses. The na- 
tives and descendants in Boston furnished the Boston Brass Band 
to play upon the occasion. The Quincy Light Infantry were 
invited to perform escort duty; the Quincy Union Singing Society, 
likewise to sing at the services in the church. 

In the Quincy Patriot of May '^^d the following gentlemen were 
announced as officers of the day. 

President — Hon. Josiah Quincy, jr. 
Vice Presidents of Quincy — Josiah Brigham, John Whitney, 
Adam Curtis, Ebenezer Bent, William Torrey, James Newcomb. 
Vice Presidents of Boston — Edward Miller, Charles F. Adams, 
Jeffrey Richardson. 
Chief Marshal — Ibrahim Bartlett. 
Assistant Marshals of Quincy — William Seaver, Caleb Gill, jr., 
Lloyd G. Horton, John Faxon 2d, Clift Rogers, George Newcomb, 
Justin Spear, Jonathan French, Josiah Babcock, jr., John C. Ed- 
wards, Jacob F. Eaton, Charles H. Brown, Joseph Whiting, Benja- 
min Hinckley, jr., Cyrus Goss, Joseph Field, Henry West. 
Assistant Marshals of Boston — Charles F. Baxter, James Brackett, 
Henry Adams, Charles E. Miller, George Savil, Charles Adams. 
In the same paper appeared the following announcement. 



44 



CENTENNIAL CELEBRATION. 

Quinnj, May 25, 1840. 
The committee of arrangements, and those gentlemen to whom 
have been assigned offices for the day, and all who have become 
subscribers to the dinner and intend to join in the procession, will 
assemble in the Universal ist Church, and all other citizens who 
intend to join in the procession are requested to assemble at said 
church, at a quarter before nine o'clock in the morning. A proces- 
sion will be formed precisely at nine o'clock, by the marshals, and 
when formed will move through Elm Street, down Hancock Street, 
into Sea Street, to the house of the Rev. Peter Wintney, where they 
will receive the orators, chaplains, invited guests, &,c. of the day, 
and from thence proceed through Sea Street to Washington Street, 
to the church where the exercises will take place. The hour of 
assembling at the Meeting-house to form in procession will be an- 
nounced by ringing the bell. 

Per order. IBRAHIM BARTLETT, Chief Marshal 

Order of the first Procession from the Univcrsalist Electing -house 
to the Stone Temple. 

Escort. 

Chief Marshal and Aids. 

President of the Day. 

Marshal. Orators and Chaplains. Marshal. 

Invited Guests. 

State Officers. 

Marshal. Vice Presidents. Marshal. 

Committee of Arrangements. 

■ Municipal Officers 

of the Towns of Quincy, Braintree, and Randolph. 

Marshal. Subscribers to the Dinner. Marshal. 

Citizens who wish to join in the Procession. 

Second Procession. 
The committee of arrangements, invited guests, and gentlemen 
who have accepted offices on the occasion, and gentlemen accom- 
panied by ladies, will assemble at the Meeting-house in the body 
pews, and all others, who are provided with tickets to the dinner, 
will assemble in the wall pews at the ringing of the bell soon after 



45 

the exercises, when a procession will be formed immediately, which 
will be divided into seven or more divisions, as circumstances may 
require, each to be headed by a marshal and numbered by lot corre- 
sponding to the tables. 

The following will be the order of the second procession. 

From the Stone Temple to the Pavilion. 

Escort. 

Chief Marshal and Aids. 

Marshal. President of the Day. Marshal. 

Orators and Chaplains. 

Invited Guests. 

Marshal. Vice Presidents. Marshal. 

Chairman of the Committee of Arrangements 

Marshal. Gentlemen accompanied by Ladies. Marshal. 

Citizens who have Tickets to the Dinner. 

The marshals are all requested to meet at the Hancock House, 
Saturday evening. May 23d, at half past seven o'clock. 

Per order. IBRAHIM BARTLETT, Chief Marshal. 

The followinsr jrentlemen will be in attendance at the Meeting- 
house to conduct ladies to seats, viz., Benjamin Page, William B. 
Duggan, Abner Willctt, Lewis Bass, Francis Williams. 

All persons who intend to dine must provide themselves with 
tickets previously to joining the procession. 

Tickets for the Ball in the evening are for sale at Gill's Book- 
store. 

By order of the Committee of Arrangements. 

JOHN A. GREEN, Chairman. 

James F. Brown, Secretary. 

CENTENNIAL CELEBRATION. 

Monday, ^5th May, 1840. 
The day dawned clear and beautiful. The weather was unusu- 
ally warm for the season, being at noon about 85° of Fahrenheit's 
thermometer. A few scudding clouds were observed about six 
o'clock, A. M., and afterwards in the southwest, which excited 
some apprehension that the day would turn out to be rainy. But 
they soon disappeared, and scarcely another cloud was visible in 



46 

the broad heavens till the sun went down. The morning was 
ushered in by the ringing of the bells on the Stone Temple and the 
Universalist Church, and by the discharge of cannon in front of the 
gun house on President's Hill. A flag waved its broad folds like- 
wise from the same eminence, and from the pavilion below. The 
roads were dry and dusty, but not a breath of wind prevailed to 
make the dust annoying. A more lovely day for the interesting 
occasion could not have been chosen by man. The smiles of heav- 
en seemed to favor the hour. Natives and descendants, friends and 
strangers soon gathered in throngs, to exchange congratulations and 
to share in the interesting associations and festivities of the day. 

At a quarter before nine o'clock the bell of the Universalist Church 
summoned all together to form the procession. A numerous con- 
course gathered up. The Q,uincy Light Infantry, attended by the 
Boston Brass Band, made a glittering and imposing appearance ; 
and the delightful martial music falling on the ear was not among 
the least of the pleasant circumstances of the day. As they passed 
along from their armory to the appointed place of assembling, 
Mount Wollaston lying off beyond them towards the sea, one might 
be forcibly impressed by the contrast between these prosperous days 
and those feeble and trying ones, when Captain Standish came from 
Plymouth with his small military band, to quell the riotous proceed- 
ings of Thomas Morton around his May-pole. 

By the promptness and judicious arrangement of the Chief Mar- 
shal and his aids, Charles F. Baxter and Thomas Adams, jr., ap- 
pointed by him, together with the assistant marshals, the proces- 
sion was soon formed, and moved in the course already described a 
few minutes after nine. Meanwhile, at nine o'clock, the bell of the 
Stone Temple had given notice that the doors were opened for the 
admission of ladies. A little longer time was occupied by the pro- 
cession in passing through the route prescribed than had been 
anticipated. The procession reached the church about a quarter 
past ten. The ladies occupied the galleries and some of the wall 
pews below. The immense area of the church was filled by the 
procession. At half past ten all were seated and the services com- 
menced. 



47 
ORDER OF EXERCISES IN THE CHURCH. 



CENTENNIAL CELEBRATION AT QUINCY, 
25 MAY, 1840. 



1. VOLUNTARY— On the Organ. 
GLEE — By the Choir. 

Hail smiling morn that tips the hills with gold, 
Whose rosy fingers ope the gates of day, 

Who the gay face of nature doth unfold, 

At whoso bright presence darkness Hies away. 

2. PRAYER OF INVOCATION. By the Rev. W. P. Lunt, of Quincy. 

3. ODE — La.ndi-ng of the Pilgrims.— Hemarw. 

[Sung by Mr. John Hollis, of Braintrec] 

The breaking waves dashed high 

On a stern and rock-bound coast, 
And the woods against a stormy sky 

Their giant branches tost ; 

And the heavy night hung dark 

The hills and waters o'er. 
When a band of exiles moored their bark 

On the wild New-England shore. 

Not as the conqueror comes. 

They, the true hearted came. 
Not with the roll of the stirring drums, 

And the trumpet that sings of fame ; 

Not as the flying come. 

In silence and in fear — 
They shook the depths of the desert's gloom 

With their hymns of lofty cheer. 

Amidst the storm they sang. 

And the stars heard, and the sea! 
And the sounding aisles of tlie dim woods rang 

To the anthem of the free ! 

The ocean-eagle soared 

From his nest by the white wave's foam, 
And the rocking pines of the forest roared — 

This was their welcome home ! 



48 

What sought they thus afar ? 

Bright jewels of the mine ? 
The wealth of seas, the spoils of war? 

— Thoy sought a faith's pure shrine ! 

Ay, call it holy ground, 

The soil wliere first they trod ! 
They left unstained what there they found — 

Freedom to worship God ! 

PRAYER. By the Rev. Peter Whitney, of Quincy. 
5. HYMN — Bij the Rev. Dr. Flint. 

In pleasant lands have fallen the lines 

That bound our goodly heritage, 
And safe beneath our sheltering vines 

Our youth is blest, and soothed our age. 

What thanks, O God, to thee are due, 

That thou didst plant our fathers here ; 
And Avatch and guard them as they grew, 

A vineyard, to the planter dear. 

The toils they bore our ease have wrought ; 

They sowed in tears — in joy we reap; 
The birthright, they so dearly bought. 

We '11 guard, till we with them shall sleep. 

Thy kindness to our fatiiers shown. 

In weal and wo through all the past, 
Their grateful sons, O God, shall own, 

While here their name and race shall last. 

G. COMMEMORATIVE DISCOURSE. 
By the Rev. George Whitney, of Roxbury. 

7. rt VOLUNTARY — B,j the Band. 

\ 
' GLEE — % the Choir. 

Land of our fathers, Avheresoe'er we roam — 
Land of our birth, to us thou still art home ; 
Peace and prosperity on thy sons attend, 
Down to posterity their influence descend. 

Though other climes may brighter hopes fulfill. 
Land of our birth, we ever love thee still ! 
Heaven shield our happy home from each hostile band, 
Freedom and plenty ever crown our native land. 



49 

9. ADDRESS TO THE YOUNG MEN. 
By the Rev. J. Gregory, of Quincy. 

10. VOLUNTARY— /% tU Band. 

11. HYMN. 

Thou Lord, through every changing scene 
Hast to thy saints a refuge been ; 
Through every age, eternal God, 
Their pleasing home, their safe abode. 

In thee our fathers sought their rest; 
In thee our fathers still are blest ; 
And, while the tomb confines their dust, 
In thee their souls abide and trust. 

Lo, we are come, a feeble race, 
Awhile to fill our fathers' place; 
Our helpless state with pity view, 
And let us share their refuge too. 

To thee our infant race we leave ; 
Them may their fathers' God receive; 
That voices yet unformed may raise 
Succeeding hymns of humble praise. 

12. POEM. By Mr. C. P. Crancii, of Boston. 

13. ANTHEM. 

Let us with a joyful mind 
Praise the Lord, for he is kind, 
For his mercies shall endure — 
Ever "faithful, ever sure. 
Hallelujah, Amen. 

14. BENEDICTION. By the Rev. Mr. Wolcott, of Quincy. 



The exercises in the Church occupied three hours and a half. 
The singing in all its parts was uncommonly fine. At the close of 
the services, the Chief Marshal gave notice that an intermission of 
fifteen minutes would take place, after which, at the ringing of the 
bell, the second procession would be formed in the order already 
stated, to proceed to the pavilion. 

7 



50 

The company were relieved by this respite, and at tliree o'clock 
were again formed in procession and on their way to the Pavilion. 
About a quarter before four all were seated at the tables, the Ladies 
affording a beautiful and pleasant relief to the large collection of 
men, which would otherwise have presented, as on all similar occa- 
sions, a dark and monotonous appearance. Between five and six 
hundred were comfortably seated at the tables. The Rev. H. G. O. 
Phipps, of Cohassett, a native of Q,uincy, invoked the divine bless- 
ing. 

The dinner was prepared by Messrs. Daniel French & Son, of 
the Hancock House, creditable to them and satisfactory to the 
guests. 

It may be worth while to mention that a company of youths, from 
Braintree and Randolph, paraded all day on horseback, arrayed 
in fantastic dresses, and attracting some attention. They fell into 
the rear of the procession, as it passed from the Church to the 
Pavilion, and during the dinner performed a variety of manceuvres 
upon the Hancock Lot to the amusement of the spectators. To 
the antiquarian eye, they might have been mistaken for a deputation 
from Morton's jovial crew, on the Merry-Mount, two hundred years 
ago. Unlike them, however, they caused no disturbance to the 
seriously disposed. Li fact, in regard to all who were gathered 
together upon the occasion, — although a much larger number were 
doubtless assembled in the town than ever before, — it may be said 
with pride and satisfaction, that the utmost order and propriety 
prevailed, — and that no single circumstance, neither accident nor 
disorder, occurred to mar the harmony, good fellowship, and pleas- 
ures of the day. 

After the company had been refreshed by a substantial and grate- 
ful repast, the Hon. Josiah Q,uincy, jr., President of the day, rose 
and said : — 

Ladies and Gentlemen, — We are assembled to commemorate 
our Fathers. Let me propose to you, therefore, as the most suit- 
able sentiment, with which we should commence, 

The memory of our Fathers. 

They to life's noblest end 
Gave up life's noblest powers, 
And bade the legacy descend 
Down, down to us and ours. 



61 

The President then proceeded to say, — We have spoken of our 
Fathers, let me next propose to you 
The memory of our Mothers. 

But not alone, nor all un])lessed, 
Our Fathers sought a place of rest; 
One dared with him to burst the knot 
That bound her to her native spot; 
In life in death with him to seal 
Her kindred love, her kindred zeal. 
In introducing the next sentiment, the President observed, — 
The distinguished honor belongs to us of having furnished the 
name of our Commonwealth. The Sagamore who governed the 
Indians in these parts had his residence upon a hill, near Squantum, 
in their language denominated Moswetuset, from whence with a 
slight variation came JMassacliusett. Let us say, then, 

Chickatahut, the Sachem of Moswetuset, the friend of our Fathers. 
Our state has taken her appellation from his council fire in Quincy, 
and has made that name a name and a praise in all the earth. 

Music by the Band, and occasional songs by Messrs. Knight, 
Dempster, and others were interspersed among the sentiments and 
speeches. The following Ode, written for the occasion by Mrs. 
L. H. Sigourney, was next sung. 

ODE, 

On the Two Hundredth .Anniversary of the Incorporation of Braintrec. 

Two hundred years ! Two hundred years ! 

Mount Wollaston could say, 
What wondrous scenes their fleeting Avings 

Have brought, and borne away ! 

The pilgrim band, the council fire, 

The war dance circling round, 
Town, tower, and spire, emblazoned bright, 

Where rock and forest frowned. 

Speak forth, speak forth — ye ancient trees, 

Whose green heads drank the dew, 
While old Naponset's ripening corn 

In slender furrows grew; 

Or while his arrows winged with death 

From subtle ambush flew, 
Where now in sainted tombs repose 

The noble and the true. 



52 

Beneath your shade the roving tribes 

Concerted 'gainst the foe, 
Or held their pagan ritual wild, — 

Red Sachem ! was it so ? 

He answeretli not. His buried race 

Have like shorn grass decayed; 
No baying of their hunter's hound 

Disturbs the green-wood glade. 

They rear their simple roofs no more, 

Nor o'er the waters blue 
With sinewy arm and venturous oar 

Propel the bark canoe. 

But ye, Avho in their places rise, 
With every blessing fraught, — * 

Give praise for all the glorious change 
Two hundred years have wrought. 

Governor Morton, who had been invited to attend, remarked in 
his letter declining the invitation, tliat the sentiment, which John 
Randolph once gave of the town of Albemarle, might well apply to 
Q,uincy ; — 

The ancient Toicn of Braiiitrcc ; — That prolific soil, which 
bears Presidents of the United States. 

The next sentiment from the chair was as follows : — 

The Schools cndotvcd by John Adams and William Coddington at 
Quincy, and the one founded by John Harvai'd at Cambridge. — A 
century hence may the school of the patriots stand second only to 
the school of the prophets. 

In reply to this President Q,uincy of Harvard College rose and 
said, that reminiscence seemed to be the appropriate object of the 
hour. In truth, he proceeded, my own mind is more filled with a 
company which is gone and by most forgotten, than with that which 
is present. Of this number is one among the earliest of my recol- 
lections, an individual who deserves to be remembered on this occa- 
sion, second to none if not first of all. 

It is now fifty-six years since, being a boy I attended my mother 
on a visit to her friend, a lady who then dwelt in that humble man- 
sion which yet stands at the foot of Pen's hill, and who was des- 
tined in future time to be the wife of one President of the United 
States, and the mother of another. I remember her, a matronly 



53 

beauty, in which respect she yielded to few of her sex, full of joy, 
and elevated with hope. Peace had just been declared, Indepen- 
dence attained, and she was preparing to go from that humble man- 
sion to join the husband whom she loved, and by whom she was 
little less than adored, at the court of St. James ; possessed with 
the consciousness as she doubtless was, that she had been by his 
side in every trial, encouraged him in every danger, and that her 
spirit had sustained him and been of his council in every vicissitude. 
Though then very young, I was impressed with the sentiment which 
frequent opportunities of acquaintance and observation in subse- 
quent life confirmed, that of her it might be as truly said as ever it 
could be of woman — she was of her own sex the glory, and of 
the other the admiration. 

Mr. Quincy then proposed — 

The memory of Abigail Adams — who to a soul chastened and 
elevated by Christian principle united the spirit of a Grecian, and 
the virtues of a Roman matron. 

A letter had been received from Ex-Governor Everett, declining 
an invitation to attend, and giving the following sentiment : 

The Ancient Town of Quincy ; — venerable parent of men, whom 
the country venerates as Fathers. 

The attention of the company was next called to the following 
song. 

OUR FOREFATHERS' SONG. 

Composed in the year 1630, — author unknoicn 

New England's annoyances you that would know them, 
Piay ponder these versos which briefly do show them. 

I. 

The place wjiere we live is a wilderness wood, 
Where grass is much wanting that's fruitful and good : 
Our mountains and hills and our valleys below, 
Being commonly covered with ice and with snow : 
And when the northwest wind with violence blows, 
Then every man pulls his cap over his nose : 
But if any 's so hardy and will it withstand, 
He forfeits a finger, a foot, or a hand. 

n. 

But when the Spring opens we then take the hoe, 
And make the ground ready to plant and to sow ; 



54 

Out corn being planted and seed being sown, 
The worms destroy much before it is grown ; 
And when it is growing some spoil there is made, 
By birds and by squirrels that pluck up the blade; 
And when it is come to full corn in the ear, 
It is often destroyed by raccoon and by deer. 

III. 

If fresh meat be wanting, to fill up our dish. 

We have carrots and turnips as much as we wish ; 

And is there a mind for a delicate dish. 

We repair to the clam banks, and there we catch fish. 

Instead of pottage and puddings and custards and pies, 

Our pumpkins and parsnips are common supplies ; 

Wo have pumpkins at morning and pumpkins at noon ; 

If it was not for pumpkins we should be undone. 

IV. 

If barley be Avanting to make into malt, 
We must be contented and think it no fault ; 
For we can make liquor to sweeten our lips. 
Of pumpkins and parsnips and Malnut tree chips. 
But you whom the Lord intends hither to bring. 
Forsake not the honey for fear of the sting ; 
But bring both a quiet and contented mind. 
And all needful blessings you surely will find. 

After this song the President said he had a living witness to its 
authenticity, and he would call on the Attorney General to sustain 
him and to propose a sentiment. 

Mr. Austin thereupon rose and said that, being thus called upon, 
he could not hesitate to say that he had, when a boy, often heard an 
ancestor of his — a lady in direct descent from the company who 
landed at Salem with Gov. Endicott in 1628 — repeat the same 
lines as she had heard them when a child, with no other difference, 
that he could recollect, from the present version, than in some pe- 
culiarities of pronunciation, which conformed to a more ancient 
system of orthoepy. 

And this incident — said Mr. Austin — as every other on this 
occasion, is calculated to carry back the mind to the times of the 
Pilgrims, and to draw before us, for new reverence and love, the 
principles and character of those worthy men, who laid the founda- 



55 

tion of whatever is most estimable in the glorious character of New 
England. Particularly are we drawn to these considerations, on 
this spot, because the settlement at Mount Wollaston, which un- 
doubtedly took place not long after tlie landing at Plymouth, is not 
without claim to be considered the oldest continuous plantation 
within the original chartered limits of Massachusetts. But it is not 
from mere local feeling that this sentiment arises. There is a gen- 
eral, universal sympathy excited by this reference to antiquity, in 
which the whole people, the friends of civil and religious liberty, 
wherever they may be, all who cherish in their hearts a veneration 
for free institutions and the rights of man deeply enter. The cause 
of it may be stated in a word. 

It is to the age of the Colonists, to the first planters of New 
England, that not only New England, but the nation of the United 
States owes its jiresent possession of constitutional liberty ; and the 
civilized world the anulioration of political government. 

Having illustrated this sentiment at considerable length, and at- 
tempted in a pleasant manner to introduce to the company, and 
enjoy tiie astonishment of some of those ancient adventurers, and 
especially that old soldier, Miles Standish, and ^^ his army of twelve 
men," who once came on a hostile expedition against Morton of 
Merry-Mount, Mr. Austin adverted to the legend, most worthy to 
be remembered on this occasion, that of all that band of Pilgrims, 
who landed from the Mayflower, it was a woman's foot that frst 
pressed the rock of Plymouth ; that it was a woman, from that 
glorious company, who, with high constancy and firm faith, began 
in an act of adventurous heroism the settlement of this mighty em- 
pire ; as it has been, in every subsequent period of its history, the 
fortitude and affection of the sex, and the purity of their domestic 
character, which have encircled it with glory. I know — said Mr. 
Austin — that the incredulous spirit of antiquarian research has 
affected to throw doubts on this romantic incident ; but tradition 
sustains it; the learned Annotalor * of the times confirms it. I be- 
lieve it. I go for the beauty of the thing, for its poetry, its bril- 
liancy, its chivalry, its romance. Yes, — take it to be true. It is 
but an original of the energy, the fortitude, the courage of the 
daughters of New England. 

* Judge Davis, Editor of Morton's Memorial. 



56 

Passing from these scenes — said Mr. Austin — there is another 
incident of deep interest connected with this occasion. This day 
is not only the second centennial of the settlement, but the second 
celebration of a centennial ! ! — 

Where are they, who rejoiced in this place, at the first revolution 
of an hundred years? Gone: — passed away! No survivor can 
tell us of the remembrances, the fears, or the hopes of that memor- 
able day. Imagination, indeed, pictures to us the generous and 
patriotic crowd of Christian men and women at the holy altar, with 
their thanks and their prayers for their country and their race. 

That first centennial was the last day of a most memorable pe- 
riod ; the first day of an era equally wonderful. The former had 
witnessed the actual settlement of the country. Its inhabitants 
were Colonists. The latter was to establish its independence. Its 
citizens were to be free. But this future was all unknown to the 
thronged assembly. They, like us, stood on that narrow isthmus, 
Avhich separated the century of the dead from the interminable 
succession of living men. No prophetic vision assured them — as 
the revolution of time has assured us — that from their public and 
private virtues, and that of the age they had celebrated, would be 
produced a liarvest of national happiness and glory, as certainly as 
the oak of the forest from the acorn whence it sprung. 

One individual might have been present on that occasion, to 
whom was to be entrusted an eminent share in the magnificent en- 
terprise. From the venerable preacher of that day, [Rev. Mr. 
Hancock,] himself the ancestor of a distinguished family, this child 
may have acquired the rudiments of a character, which was mate- 
rially to secure the independence of his country, and establish the 
immortality of his fame. 

Yes, Sir, John Adams, — to whom we now look back as to a 
colossal monument of our country's glory, — was then a child of 
five years old, destined to bear onward and upward, in all the 
storms of political dissention, and in the earthquake of revolution, 
the ark of his country's independence. 

It is glory enough for any portion of our land to have been the 
birth-place of John Adams. It is something to tell of and to boast 
of, by those of us, who had the good fortune personally to know 
him, that we have sat at the feet of Gamaliel, and drank of the 
inspiration of his lips. 



57 

My first recollection of Quincy — said Mr. Austin — was in the 
good fortune, wiiich, soon after my college life, brought me into an 
acquaintance — so far as a boy might hold the relation — with this 
eminent statesman ; and I have never ceased to regret, that, when 
afterwards I was domiciliated in a family where he was a familiar 
visitor, I had not preserved a record of the thousand anecdotes, 
which enlivened his profound remarks on politics and men. They 
would have formed a volume more interesting than Bosvvell, and 
more profitable than Waverley. We look. Sir, for some authentic 
record of the debates in Congress on the question of Independence, 
One of the eminent statesmen of our own age has attempted, in 
the manner of the classic historians, to supply the want by an 
imaginary speech of Mr. Adams. 

" Sink or swim, live or die, survive or perish, I give my heart 
and hand to this vote." 

It has the force, directness, energy, and abruptness of the man ; 
but it is only an imitation. There is extant a speech, which, Mr. 
Austin said, he had good reason to believe, was delivered by 
Mr. Adams, and written out from his own notes at the time, full of 
argument, abounding in illustration, sparkling with classic beauty 
and poetical quotation, equally nervous, direct, impassioned, and 
abrupt. 

" The great God, Sir, who is the searcher of all things, will wit- 
ness for me, that I have spoken to you in the fulness and purity of 
my heart." 

It is not compatible, Mr. Austin said, with any reasonable time 
he could ask, to follow out the life of this distinguished citizen of 
Quincy. AVhile the reverend preacher of the first century looked 
back with a laudable pride on the fame of Carver and Endicott and 
Winthrop, it is not probable his imagination suggested to him, that 
" a greater than these were there." The eloquent and learned 
speaker, who addressed us this day, and who warmed our hearts 
with gratitude for the unnumbered blessings of Providence in every 
exigency of our country, could not foresee the occasions nor the 
men, who, in the coming century, are to be rivals to the patriots 
and statesmen of the past. But we may trust, humbly indeed, but 
yet with becoming confidence, that in any circumstances there may 

8 



arise from the virtues of our ancestors some kindred spirits worthy 
to claim alliance with such glorious progenitors. 
Mr. Austin then proposed as a sentiment — 
The respect of posterity for the memory of John Adams. 

The President next proposed — 

John Whcehoright , the first minister of Quincy, the friend of 
Sir Henry Vane. He was exiled for that liberty from this land, for 
which his friend expired on the scafTold. 

In reply to this, the Rev. Wm. P. Lunt, junior minister of the First 
Congregational Church, rose and acknowledged the honor paid to 
the first preacher at the Mount. He then glanced at several cir- 
cumstances presenting an amusing contrast between the present 
and the past, — alluded to Morton's May-pole and to the decora- 
tions of the pavilion, in which the company were seated, and closed 
by offering 

The May-pole of 1627 and the Blay-pole q/" 1840 — the oppo- 
site poles of festivity. 

The next sentiment was from the Chair : — 

John Adams, a native of Quincy. The glory of his life, like the 
day of his death, shall never fail from the remembrance of the sons 
of men. 

The following letter, received from the Hon. J. Q,. Adams> was 
then read by the President. 

John A. Green, 

Chairman of the Committee of Arrangements. 

Washington, 18 May, 1840. 
Sir, — I have received your letter of the 7th inst., containing 
the obliging invitation to me to attend the celebration of the cen- 
tennial anniversary of the incorporation of the town of Braintree, 
on the 25th of this month. The necessity of my attendance upon 
my public duties at this place, deprives me of the power of com- 
plying with this invitation, for which I am duly grateful. I pray 
the company to accept instead of my presence my best wishes for 
the health and happiness of them all. 

I am, very respectfully. Sir, 

Your obedient serv't, 

J. a. ADAMS. 



59 

After which he proposed — 

John Quincy Adams — This is not an occasion to praise the liv- 
ing; and distant be the day when any inscription shall bear his 
name, or any tongue pronounce his eulogy. 

And following this 

The name of John Hancock, a native of Quincy, — With Ameri- 
can Liberty it arose — with American Liberty alone it can perish. 

The following letter was received from Professor John G. Pal- 
frey. 

Boston, 2M May, 1830. 

Dear Sir, — I am unexpectedly deprived, by an unavoidable 
engagement, of the pleasure which I promised myself, when I ac- 
cepted the invitation, with which I was honored by the citizens 
of Q,uincy, to attend the very interesting occasion of Monday next. 
If a convenient opportunity occurs, will you do me the favor to 
submit, in my behalf, the following sentiment to the attention of 
the company ? 

The Town of Quincy — The home of Wheelwright and Coddiag- 
ton ; the birth place of Hancock, the Adamses, and the Quincys; 
a spot to be held in everlasting remembrance in the history of re- 
ligious and civil liberty. 

The following sentiment was received from Hon. Robert C 
Winthrop, who was prevented by other engagements from comply- 
ino- with the invitation to attend : — 

Braintrce and Quincy — Their men and their hills — their scions 
and their sienitc ; the first have furnished some of the ablest hands 
by which our Revolution was achieved; the last has supplied the 
materials of the proudest monument by which it will be commemor- 
ated. 

The President then proposed 

John Adams and Josiah Quincy, Jr. — The defenders of Pres- 
ton. Together they stood as the advocates of Liberty and Law, — 
together they sleep amid the graves of their Fathers; 

"Thus joined in fame, in friendship tried, — 
No chance could sever, nor the grave divide." 



60 

The Rev. George Whitney of Roxbury, being requested to give 
a sentiment, rose and said: — It will not be expected of me, Mr. 
President, after the long and I am afraid sufficiently tedious utter- 
ance I have already put forth, to make anytliing like a set speech 
here, but I will ask your patience and that of our friends in recur- 
ring to a brief incident of former times. 

As I passed, a day or two since, the place where we are now 
assembled, and saw the Pavilion going up in preparation for this 
interesting occasion, an anecdote occurred to me I had heard a 
long lime ago in reference to the elder Adams, the point of which 
may be turned with singular force to this spot and the distinguished 
personages associated with it. It is said that when President 
Adams, senior, was minister to the Court of St. James, he was 
called upon, at his lodgings, by Sir Benjamin West, who invited 
him to a morning walk. They went out together as far as Ken- 
sington Gardens, conversing on various topics. Upon their arrival 
at the spot already named, Sir Benjamin West thrust his cane 
into the ground, and with a strong expression of patriotic feeling, 
turning at the same time to Mr. Adams, exclaimed, " Here, Sir, was 
the origin of the American Revolution." "How so?" said Mr. 
Adams. " It was thus," replied Sir Benjamin. " When George 
III. was about to take to himself Queen Charlotte, following the 
wisdom of the old adage — first your cage and then your bird — he 
summoned one of his ministers into his presence, and informed him 
that it was his purpose to have a new Palace for the Queen : and 
that the necessary funds must forthwith be supplied. ' We have noth- 
ing in the Treasury,' replied the minister, ' not a penny.' ' That 
will be no impediment,' replied the King; 'the Palace we must 
have ; we have only to tax the Colonies.' — The Colonies were 
taxed. The stamp act was imposed. We see what they got by it. 
Here, Sir, was the origin of the American Revolution." * 

When we come to speak of the secondary causes of that great 

* The reader may find a little different version of this anecdote in Tudor's 
Life of James Otis, p. 206. Tlie main incidents, however, are the same. 
Hyde Park and Kensington Gardens join each other: and it was somewhere 
thereabouts, — on the spot occupied by Sir Benjamin West, — where the 
King had proposed to locate the palace. Possibly the pleasing of the Queen 
might have concerned him less than the pleasing of himself or even of his 
courtiers. 



61 

event, Mr. President, — for independent of all that might be gathered 
up, we cannot but feel that from the development of the original 
principles on which the Pilgrims started, the Revolution and the 
Declaration of Independence were both sooner or later certain to 
come forth, — it seems to me, that it turns out to be our privilege 
with singular propriety and force, on this very spot, to imitate the 
action of Sir Benjamin West, and to say with emphasis, in his 
own words also — Here, here, Sir, was the origin of the American 
Revolution. 

This spot, Sir, was the birth-place of John Hancock, whose name 
is first on the scroll of the Declaration of Independence. The 
house that gave him birth, and in which his cradle was rocked, 
stood but a few yards from the head of this Pavilion. The remains 
of the cellar are visible yet. In after times this place became first 
the residence of the glowing patriot, Josiah Quincy, Jr., and down 
further still a part of the landed property of the illustrious John 
Adams, "par iiobile fratnan." When we consider what were the 
signal and successful cfTorts of these eminent champions of liber- 
ty in the great cause alluded to, we can hardly find room for a 
doubt, that but for their agency the American Revolution might 
not and the Declaration of Independence certainly would not have 
occurred as early as they did. Here, then, may wc also be permit- 
ted to say was the origin of these great events. 

I have already, in another place, alluded to some of the eminent 
personages who in earlier and later times have honored our soil. 
Fabulous history tells us that Cadmus, having slain the Dragon 
that guarded the fountain sacred to Mars, sowed his teeth, and 
there sprung up from them armed men. Our fiithers, if they did 
not slay the Dragon of persecution, would not at least suffer them- 
selves to be slain by him. Instead of his teeth, they sowed here 
their own principles, which in time were destined to grind him to 
powder. 

In conclusion, I will give you as a sentiment, 

Our beloved native soil — May there be springing up from it, in 
all the future as in the two hundred years that are past, armed 
men, — armed neither with sword, helmet, nor buckler, but with 
those exalted principles, the hope of the world, which elevate 
at the same time that thev adorn humanity. 



62 

Dr. Z. B. Adams next rose, at the request of the President, and 
gave 

The Granite Rocks of Quincy, as connected with he?' prosperity 
and wealth: — In the words of the eloquent orator of the day, I 
would say, " he who despairs under such a burden deserves not to 
know what he carries." 

The President then requested a sentiment from Charles F. Adams, 
Esq., who began by remarking that, although entirely unused to any 
public appearance on occasions of this kind, he could not resist 
the feeling which prompted him to express to all who were here 
assembled, the deep sense of gratitude he entertained for the very 
kind notice that had been this day taken of those with whom na- 
ture had connected him. 

Yet, in considering whatever share of merit it was the present 
disposition to award to their public services, the reflection ought 
at once to suggest itself, that it was the offspring of the soil of this 
old town and the natural consequence of the principles early incul- 
cated and long adhered to. And when Mr. Adams looked around 
him and thought of the names of many of the persons who sat 
here, and compared them with those which are recorded in the 
annals of the town, even from the day of its settlement, it was 
matter of gratification to him to find how often they proved the 
same. These might indeed be regarded as the good old roots (if 
he could be allowed the expression) first planted in a healthy soil, 
which had been going on from generation, shooting forth new and 
green and healthy branches, conducing at one and the same mo- 
ment to be the pride, the ornament, and the support of our common 
country. 

It had been already remarked, in another place, this day, how 
fruitful this town was in associations, and this Mr. Adams took 
to be the great use of celebrations of the sort. They revived the 
recollections of the past, and presented ideas which could not fail 
to produce a beneficial action of the mind for the future. Indeed, 
how could it be otherwise, when there was hardly a spot in Quincy 
to which a young man could look, without thinking of something 
in connexion with it to improve his heart or to rectify his head ? 
Here, on this very site we were now occupying, it was that a worthy 
pastor lived, who passed his days not merely in teaching his flock 



63 

the principles of faith, but gave the best evidence of his success in 
instilling rules of practical conduct, by educating a son, (John 
Hancock,) who, when he came of age and the day of trial arrived 
and he was called upon to choose between the probable loss of 
fortune and adherence to his country, never hesitated, but bravely 
stuck to his country and let the fortune go. 

And here, too, on this same spot, succeeded to him another 
father, who brought up another son, (Josiah Quincy, Jr.) And 
this son as he advanced in life devoted his strength to the cause 
of his country. And when it pleased God that this strength should 
depart from him, and he fell into weakness of body, then came 
the trial for his patriotism. He was told by his physicians in Eng- 
land that, if he wished to recover, he must abandon his duties and 
go to recruit his exhausted powers at certain medicinal springs — 
yet notwithstanding this, he chose to go on, to stick to his country 
and to give up his life. 

After such examples, it was not fit that the dwelling, which 
knew them both, should stand the risk of desecration by succes- 
sors of less exalted purposes. And it had been the will of Heaven, 
as if designing to prevent it, that a fire should soon after break 
forth and sweep it from the face of men. Yet the land remains 
and will continue, it is to be hoped, in hands ever anxious to pro- 
vide that it shall be put only to noble uses. 

Again, there was still at the foot of a hill yonder, an old house 
which had been the dwelling of a worthy farmer — and he had 
given little to his son (John Adams) but right notions. Yet, even 
these proved to him in after life an ample inheritance, for he fol- 
lowed them out, and as God was pleased to grant to him a mod- 
erate competency and long life, he went straight forward in his 
course, and died as he had lived with independence on his lips. 

These were instances of a more extended reputation than fell 
to the lot of most of our other citizens, but it was not for a mo- 
ment to be supposed that the same feeling, which made itself so 
visible to the world in them, did not glow with equal ardor in the 
breasts of their fellows of this town. Why, it was but a few days 
ago that Mr. Adams was reading a letter — yes, a letter from a 
Quincy wom.an to her husband, dated in the second year of the 
revolutionary struggle, in which she writes to him that even then 
more than half of the male population of the town, between the 



64 

ages of fifteen and sixty, was acting in the field or on the water 
against the British, and that if this went on much further the 
women would have to gather the harvest ; and she adds, that for her 
own part she thinks she could help to gather the corn and husk 
it, but she fears she should make a poor figure at digging pota- 
toes. 

Mr. Adams concluded by again exhorting the young men of the 
town to be mindful of these facts, for they could be turned to use- 
ful account even in the regulation of the daily industry of life. 
In allusion to the incident quoted from the letter, he would pro- 
pose for a toast — 

The harvest of 1776 in the town of IBi-aintree — When the corn 
and potatoes were left to be gathered by the women, because a more 
precious crop, matured from the seedtime of 1640, demanded the 
labor of all the men. 

Mr. C. P. Cranch, poet of the day, at the solicitation of the chair, 
presented the following sentiment : — 

The New England character; — Like our Granite hills, may it 
long continue to clothe over the everlasting rock of principle with 
the evergreen of the best and most beautiful affections, 

I rise — said Mr. Frederic A. Whitney — at your request, Mr. 
President, by the side of the poet of the day, but failing to catch 
the inspiration of his fancy and beauty with which he has enter- 
tained us, turn to the musty rolls of tradition for an incident which 
may be recalled as we commemorate the Fathers of our Town and 
those eminent in character and life, who have trodden its soil. Of 
this latter class, one has been passed over, whom, two centuries 
since, the court and ministers of the second Charles would hardly 
have spared. It has been reputed that our forest and rocks be- 
came the shelter and resting place of one of that large body, who, 
favoring the sect of the Independents, brought Charles I. to the 
block, and at the restoration of his son to the throne, fled for their 
lives from England. 

Some years since, I gathered from the lips of an aged citizen 
of this town, whose numerous descendants are yet with us, who 
was remarkable for his retentive memory and exceeding accuracy 
in all matters of fact, this tradition. His childhood, he told me, 
had been with those who had conversed with this lonely exile for 



65 

liberty. Within his own memory, there had stood on a hillock, 
not far from the spot on which we are assembled, the humble abode 
of the old refugee. Here, as said tradition, under the assumed 
name of Revel, he lived and died; and his funeral was honored 
by the attendance of his Excellency, the Provincial Governor, 
and of distinguished men from the neighboring metropolis of 
Boston. 

I stand not up to claim for this ancient personage a place among 
the Regicide Judges. The historian of the United States, whom 
we hoped to have seen with us this day, has not written his name 
with those of Whalley, Gofle, and Dixwell, known to have been 
three of the Judges who found shelter in America, dwelling first 
in Massachusetts and afterwards fleeing to Connecticut. But the 
restoration of Charles II. made other victims than the Judges a 
sacrifice to the memory of his beheaded father ; else Peters, for 
instance, the friend, ' honored and beloved' of Roger Williams, 
might have escaped the gallows. And if not one of those who 
sat in judgment on King Charles 1., doubtless our exile was one 
who for their principles and in their cause fled to our shores. 

It was enacted concerning the oracle of Pythos, that though it 
uttered doubtful responses, they should not be utterly disregarded. 
So without blindly reverencing, should we ever regard the voice 
of tradition. On the strength of the tradition now cited, and for 
the sake of adding another name to those whom this day brings to 
mind, I will propose, Sir, 

The Mcmori/ of Thomas Revel, an Exile for civil lihcrtij from 
his own land to this place — May the principles of freedom, for 
which with the Stuarts he contended, live ever on the soil that be- 
came the home of the Puritan and the English Independent. 

Hon. B. L. Wales of Randolph next proposed 

William Coddington — familiarly known to the youngest school- 
boy of Braintrce as the munificent donor of the Coddington School 
Fund : his memory will be cherished, and his name hallowed by 
all future generations, so long as common schools continue the pride 
of New England, — the right-arm of our national defence. 

John W^hitney, Esq., in proposing a sentiment, remarked — that 
in reflecting upon the great and good men who had been reared 
upon our soil, and casting our thoughts forward to the ages that 

9 



66 

should follow, the great question rose before us to be settled, — 
whether, so far as depended upon our exertions, the long line of 
eminent individuals should be continued, or a broken link should 
fall out in the chain connecting the present with the future. This 
question — he continued — rests for its decision upon the young 
men of our town. I will, therefore, Mr. President, offer as a sen- 
timent — 

T/tc Young 3Ien of Quincy : — When they recollect the states- 
men and patriots who have claimed this as their birth-place, may 
they be emulous to follow them in all that is great and good, and 
thus become the ornaments and the pride of our land. 

Captain Josiah Brigham, one of the former commanders of the 
Quincy Light Infantry, addressed the chair as follows: — 

Mr. President, — Having been called on for a sentiment, I would 
merely remark, that it was not my privilege to be born in duincy. 
But, Sir, it has been my fortune to spend the largest portion of my life 
in this ancient and distinguished town. I have lived here very hap- 
pily with the inhabitants for about thirty years, and I feel as though 
I had a right to share, in some degree, in that just pride which 
the native born inhabitants feel, from the circumstance that this 
town can justly boast of having given birth to a greater number of 
Presidents and eminent men than any other town in the State, or 
in the United States. It gives me great pleasure, on this interesting 
occasion, to meet with so many of the inhabitants of Q,uincy, and 
with those who originated here, but whose fortunes have caused 
them to locate in other places. And it gives me additional pleasure, 
at this lime, to meet again with the military Company who have 
this day performed escort duty. It was my fortune, in the early 
part of my life, to be associated with that Company ; and conse- 
quently I have ever since felt an interest in its continued existence 
and prosperity, — a gratification also in meeting with them, as it 
always brings to my mind fresh recollections of past feelings and 
associations. That Company is now one of the oldest, if not the 
very oldest, Light Company in the Commonwealth. It is now fifty 
years old, and but a k\\ weeks since it celebrated the fiftieth anni- 
versary of its incorporation. — In the time of the last war between 
the United States and Great Britain, in the foil of 1814, that Com- 
pany was called out by the State authorities, and ordered to march 



67 

to Boston. It was stationed at South Boston, where it remained in 
the service of its country for about two months. It was my lot to 
be a member of the Company at that lime. Since then the Com- 
pany has passed into other hands. At this hour it is one of the 
best disciplined and most respectable Independent Companies in 
the State. Sir, I will on this occasion give as a sentiment, 

The Quincy Light Iiifaniri/ — Now Mty years old. Its mem- 
bers always ready to answer the call of their country — always 
ready to perform escort duty. May the Company continue to exist 
in prosperity from generation to generation, until it shall perform 
escort duty on the Third Centennial Anniversary of the incorpo- 
ration of this ancient and honored town. 

The Rev. John Gregory proposed the following sentiment : — 
The sons and daughters of Quincy — May they mingle with their 
patriotism the social and domestic virtues, and may their firesides 
be the calm retreat of every heartfelt enjoyment of "sweet home." 

Mr. John A. Green, chairman of the committee of arrangements, 
offered — 

The Fair Sex — Our joy in youth, — our companions in man- 
hood, — our solace in age- 
Mr. James F. Brown proposed 

Quincy, Braintrcc, and Randolph — May they become united 
in sentiment and feeling as when combined under one act ot Incor- 
poration. 

The President announced the following sentiment from James 
Newcomb, Esq. of duincy, which he said the gentleman preferred 
not to deliver himself, for a reason which would be obvious to the 
ladies when they heard it. 

Woman — the friend and guide of man — Her sphere is the do- 
mestic circle — her influence the " still small voire." 

The ladies being applied to for a sentiment, presented the follow- 
ing in reply. 

The gentleman toho first voted to admit the ladies to a public 
dinner — May his table never want the comfort and graces, not 
omitting the still small voice, which it is their vocation to furnish. 

After this followed a number of volunteer sentiments. 



68 



VOLUNTEER SENTIMENTS. 

Fair Harvard — A contemporary of the pilgrim fathers — with 
the experience of two centuries, she intrusts her literary treasures 
and her historical inscriptions to the Q,uincy granite. 

The Blue Hill — The first landmark hailed by the mariner as 
he approaches the still bay of the Massachusetts. May the princi- 
ples of those who first settled at its foot be as permanent as its color 
and as enduring as its base. 

John Wheelicright and Oliver Cronmcll — They set a ball in 
motion which the whole civilized world cannot stop. 

27te blessings toe derive from our fathers — Like the light of 
the source of day reflected from every object we forget the fount 
from which it flowed. 

The shadows of the past — They leave no trace behind, but 
they give grace and beauty to the spot over which they hover. 

Those who take their drop from the bucket ; — they will never be 
found with the drop in their eye. 

The day — When we make a pastime out of past time. 

The first settler of Quincy — Although a man cannot always 
be merry and wise, at proper times it is wise to be merry. 

The Farmers of Quincy — May they suffer no root of bitter- 
ness to spring up among us, nor any to show the cloven foot, except 
they be neat cattle. 

Those who live on Rock Common — May they soon be again able 
to make their bread out of stone. 

The first Railroad in the United States — It connected the rocky 
mountain in Cluincy with the Atlantic. The last Railroad in the 
United States — it shall connect the Rocky Mountains of the West 
with both the Atlantic and the Pacific tide. 

The City of Quincy in Adams County, Illinois, and the towns 
of Quincy in Florida, Mississippi, and Tennessee — May their pros- 



69 

perity be as lasting as our own, although it is not like ours, founded 
upon a rock. 

Our Fathers — Fishermen before they were shepherds — they 
got along by hook as well as by crook. 

Independence — Its first germ appeared on Mount Wollaston ; 
and when, one hundred and fifty years after, it was publicly pro- 
claimed, a son of Eraintree, one of its most distinguished advocates, 
urged its annual celebration with bonfires and illuminations ; this 
son is now its fearless supporter even on the floor of Congress; may 
it be held sacred in our country " till rolling years shall cease to 
move. " 



Dr. Z. B. Adams then addressed the chair as follows : — 

Mr. President, — We have alluded with great propriety to our 

Fathers and our Mothers, — the early settlers of New England. 

It appears to me there is still a very interesting class, whom it 

would be wrong in us to pass by with neglect, — the young ladies. 

And I will venture to add, therefore, even at this late hour. 

The Young Ladies, emigrants to this country in 1620; — they 
must have been possessed of energy and true fire, for they caught 
their sparks from the " Leydcn Jar." 

Dr. Lewis Joseph Glover followed Dr. Adams with some very 
entertaining professional remarks in allusion to Quincy, his native 
place, — his interest in her welfare, and the healthy state in which, 
in her advanced age, her symptoms evidently discovered her to be. 
But the lateness of the hour, and the movement already making 
towards an adjournment, did not enable him to say all that he in- 
tended. 

The sun was already rapidly declining. The President of the 
day, early in the course of the dinner, had presented to the atten- 
tion of the company a piece of parchment, headed with a part of 
the closing paragraph in the Discourse of the Hon. Daniel Webster 
at Plymouth in 1820, on which it was his wish that the names of 
those present should be written ; — the parchment then to be de- 
posited in some safe place and handed down to those who should 
come up to celebrate a similar occasion, one hundred years hence. 



70 

This suggestion was readily complied with, and two hundred and 
eighty-six names were subscribed. 

The President likewise suggested in closing, that in order to 
connect the present more particularly with the coming century, 
and to honor the day, the young men of Q,uincy should form a 
society, for the purpose of ornamenting the town with trees, es- 
pecially the burial yard, which, growing for a century, should 
appear in perfection to tlie company on the 25th of May, 1940. 
This suggestion likewise met with a cheerful and ready response. 

The President then further suggested that as the meeting was 
about to be broken up, they should adjourn, to meet in the same 
place, to celebrate the Third Centennial Anniversary on the 25th 
of May, 1940, which was adopted without a dissenting voice. 

The company then left the pavilion, and might be seen wending 
their ways towards their various homes, — the bells on the churches 
ringing out their merry peals, — the cannon on President's Hill 
pouring its echoing roars over hill and valley, and the sun with 
his retiring rays gilding the distant hill tops as with glittering 
gold. 

The evening was spent in social and family intercourse, recounting 
the interesting events and associations of the day, and by a party of 
young ladies and gentlemen in a Ball at the Hancock House. 

We cannot close this imperfect sketch of the Celebration, some 
account of which we were anxious to transmit to those who should 
come after us, better than in the beautiful language of the orator at 
Plymouth, and so happily inscribed, by the President of the day, at 
the head of the parchment already alluded to. Including the whole 
matter it runs thus. 

HANCOCK LOT — QUINCY — MASSACHUSETTS. 



We who celebrate the 25th of May, 1840, would welcome you, 
who a century hence shall fill the places we now fill, " to this pleas- 
ant land of the Fathers. We bid you welcome to the healthful skies 
and the verdant fields of New England. We greet your accession 
to the great inheritance, which we have enjoyed. We welcome 
you to the blessings of good government and religious liberty. We 
welcome you to the treasures of science and the delights of learn- 



71 

ing. We welcome jou to the transcendent sweets of domestic 
life, to the happiness of kindred and parents and children. We 
welcome you to the immeasurable blessings of rational existence, 
the immortal hope of Ciiristianity, and the light of everlasting 
truth!" 



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